


Its Inevitable

by ThisIsMyVoice



Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Archery Lessons, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Moonlight, Romance, Some Humor
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-12-25
Updated: 2015-09-03
Packaged: 2018-03-03 12:21:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 38,480
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2850701
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThisIsMyVoice/pseuds/ThisIsMyVoice
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Its minutes before Smaug descends on the people of lake-town and hours to the final battle. Kili is determined to help his friends no matter what and Tauriel decides to help him.<br/>A dash of romance, a sprinkling of humor, a few bows and arrows, kili's muscle's and Tauriel's skills - what happens when you put an elf and a dwarf who might maybe, kinda love each other in a moonlit clearing to prepare for what just might be the fight of their lives?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Please forgive any mistakes regarding history, mythology, archery and any other aspect of this story; i've just recently began getting re-acquainted with Tolkien's world. thank you :)

When she comes across him at the center of the large clearing, Tauriel freezes, one foot suspended in the air almost comically before she sets it down and quickly moves behind a nearby tree. A wave of multiple feelings rolls through her, all of them catching her off guard: pleasure, because he was kili and he’d just been healed yet here he was standing in front of her. Concern, because he was kili and he’d just been healed yet hear he was standing in front of her; the strangest flutter in her stomach, stutter in her heartbeat that made her draw further back into the shadows, nervous in a way that made her nervous about being nervous. She didn’t want him to see her, didn’t want to know whether he remembered everything he said, if the feel of her fingers had impressed themselves as deeply into his memory as his had in hers…

He’s removed the rough-spun cotton shirt he’d been given and is in nothing but a sleeveless, black, net-like undershirt and his trousers. Kili strings another arrow into his bow, draws it till his bow is so tense its almost vibrating and then let’s the arrow fly. It slices through the air and thuds impressively close to the centre of the tree trunk but she notes that if he had been aiming for the head of an orc, his arrow would have sailed harmlessly by. He’s breathing heavily, his hand absently going to the gash on his knee and Tauriel frowns, wondering how long he’s been here practicing like this.

Its almost midnight, almost the dawn of a new day and the air is heavy with the promise that soon something wicked this way comes; it's in the coolness of the wind, the whispering of the trees, the inky blackness of the night sky - lower than she’s ever seen it; There are no stars. Frequently, achingly through this night, she has thought of Legolas and Orcs; dimly, vaguely she has thought of dragons; confusingly, terrifyingly, she has thought of dwarves. one dwarf in particular- kili…  
Kili and dreams, and forbidden Elvin women that walked in starlight, kili and his fingers, light as feathers, trembling slightly as they interlocked with hers, Kili’s warmth, and Kili’s smile, Kili’s 'could she ever love me' and the sudden rapid- fire thudding of her heart.

Just thinking about it affects her, makes her flush in a way that’s wholly discomfiting. She’s captain of Thranduil's guard, she’s not supposed to be hiding behind trees and blushing at the thought of a dwarf and yet. ..She rubs her fingers together absently, feeling his phantom touch, contemplating. She’s torn. Between wanting to go to him and wanting to walk away.

The strength of the emotions that had surged within her tonight is nothing less than disconcerting. Her wandering through the forest was an attempt to get perspective….and while away enough time that she could be sure that Kili really was alright. Now that he’s standing in front of her firing arrows, she guesses she’s free to leave, except…  
Except, there’s something about being here, watching him that makes the confused swirling inside her settle a bit. He notches another arrow and Tauriel is watching the straight line his arm makes as he draws it, the flexing of the muscles in his arm, the network pattern of veins under his skin…he’s the exact opposite of any elf she’s ever known, the exact opposite of Legolas – tanned where Legolas is alabaster white. Small, dark, curled hairs on his arms where Legolas is smooth. Short and sturdy where Legolas is tall and graceful – he’s the exact opposite of the one man that she’s ever consciously wanted so why is it she wonders, that standing here, the world bathed in moonlight, Kili has the ability to make her heart race, her mouth go dry?  
Or that when she sees the raised scar ridges running here and there across his arms, one particularly jagged cut near his shoulder, there’s a part of her that wants to run her hand across them, wants to know if they’re smooth or rough, as warm as his fingers against hers; she wants to ask him if they hurt, thinks that if they did, even though she’s a couple of years late, she might still be tempted to kiss the pain away.

Dear gods she thinks she might be losing her mind.

She’s about to turn and leave, when Kili’s sharp cry has her whirling around her heart in her throat. She’s already pulled out her dagger, a hand on her bow as her eyes dart to and fro. There’s no orc, no new arrow imbedded in his flesh, no attack, but he’s sunk to one knee and is clutching at his leg, his face contorted in pain.

Her weapons are sheathed before she knows she’s sheathed them and she’s so focused on him, she doesn’t realize she’s taken several steps towards him until moonlight falls across her form, threatening to reveal her; then, she pauses, conflicted between wanting to help and not wanting to complicate matters even further; to have to answer a question she has no idea how to.

He’s panting, sweat beading across his brow which he angrily swipes away. “c’mon Kili,” he urges himself, “if you’re going to be no good in the main battle, at least support them with this, c’mon Kili” he knocks a fist against the wound and even though its not hers, everything in Tauriel is clenching because she knows how much it must hurt. Twice, thrice, his face twists in pain and Tauriel is a second from rushing to him and arresting his hand when he surges to his feet. He’s off balance and needs to hobble a bit before he can stand without wincing and even then, he’s leaning notably on his good leg.

Its ridiculous; she’s removed the poison but the wound is still there, raw and unhealed. He should be resting, not preparing for a war he should have no part in. she should tell him so, except…even from the distance she is away from him, she can see his determination in the set of his shoulders, hear it in the name of every one of his brothers in arms he calls out as he fires each arrow.  
She knows what it is to go to war, knows what it’s like to lose friends - elves she’s known like brothers - and can’t imagine the anguish of having to sit on the sidelines and watch her family die around her. She understands him perfectly and strangely enough, she’s pretty sure that in the Elvin dungeons, talking about starlight and freedom he understood her too.

She hesitates just a second more before making her choice and then, she’s perfectly steady as she walks towards him, no longer unsure; she does not know what the future will hold, but for tonight, she has a gift to give him.

When she’s barely a meter away, she calls out, “not bad for a dwarf!”

Kili starts visibly, the complete silence of her approach taking him off guard and Tauriel bites her lip to hide a smile because he’s…kind of cute when he’s startled.

“Tauriel?”

And there’s something about that, the way he says her name that makes her grow warm. He’s watching her like he’s seen a ghost and she’d almost forgotten that he’d thought she’d been a dream.

“you’re really here,” Kili breathes, still looking shell-shocked, “but…then…” she can see him thinking it through, knows the exact moment when he remembers his delirious words because his eyes find hers, widening slightly in something like panic.

He opens his mouth to say something and though she’s not sure, she has the nastiest feeling that’s its either going to be painfully awkward bumbling or worse, an apology and though she doesn’t know exactly how she feels about everything that’s happened, she does know that she doesn’t want him to apologize for… anything. So she cuts him off before he can speak, repeating herself and nodding towards the tree studded with arrows, letting a small smile curve the corner of her mouth “not bad for a dwarf”

He catches her eyes again and if he’s surprised by the reprieve he's too relieved to question it. They'll leave that particular moment in time alone. It wasn’t something that could be brought up now with dragons, orcs, darkness and chaos. There would be more than enough time to talk after, more than enough time to figure out the answer to his question but for now,

“you do this often?” she asks him while stepping closer. Kili hesitates for just a second and then grins, “well yeah, of course, all the time but mostly before major wars. Gotta keep the skills of the best archer in the realm sharp.” He couldn’t resist the tiny poke.

It earns him a raised eyebrow as Tauriel steps nearer, her mouth curving in an amused smile. “best in the entire realm?... really? are you sure about that?”

“Absolutely, unless you know, you think you can do better?” he says it casually enough but its clearly a challenge. For just a second when she pauses, looking at him with unreadable eyes he thinks he may have gone too far, misjudged the liberties he was actually allowed to take with her and she would avenge her insulted Elvin sensibilities by shooting him full of arrows...

But then Tauriel grins and he almost breathes out a sigh of relief. He returns her grin.

He offers her his bow but she waves it away and pulls out hers instead.

Kili makes a show of rolling his eyes and because his leg is throbbing but he doesn’t want to alarm her - rests his bow on the ground and leans on it. “you know, I don’t know why elves make such a big deal about these things; its literally just a bow, mine works just as well as – ”

_Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh._

Kili trails off, his mouth still open as Tauriel sends three arrows flying in such rapid succession that her hands are a blur. The first arrow strikes dead center of a tree a couple of several feet behind the tree he was practicing on. The second splits the first and the third splits the second and sends an impressive crack right through the middle of the tree. One more arrow and he thinks she might actually succeed in splitting the tree in half.

Tauriel sends him a look so smug he has to laugh. Giving a bow that’s more than a little exaggerated, he acknowledges her superiority, “very well, fair warrior, queen of bows and arrows, vanquisher of orcs,”

* _Walker in starlight_ *, the words sound in both their minds.

"Healer of dwarves,” she grins at that one, “you’ve proved your bow superior to mine.”

Again an eyebrow raises and Kili can _feel_  the skepticism in that one look. “oh, it is not about the bow,” she counters.

“oh? Prove it” he tosses her his and admires the deft movement with which she catches it, not even blinking. Kili folds his arms, thoroughly enjoying himself. Enough at least to take his mind of his injured leg. He nods towards the tree with mock seriousness. “that is you know, if you ca –”

_Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh_

This time his jaw drops open. Dead center again, each arrow splitting the one before it and the tree groans ominously, before parting clean down the center to the point where  Tauriel’s arrows had widened the split in the bark.

“damn” kili murmurs softly as she moves to stand beside him, examining her handy-work with a small smile.

After a long second Kili chuckles and drags a hand through his hair, his mouth forming a twisted smile. “Guess I’m a worse shot than I thought then.” His tone is bitterly amused and Tauriel silently considers him, knowing that his mood comes largely from his wound and yet not liking the half- mocking tone he uses for himself.  
Instead of telling him that it’ll be fine, that his brothers in arms won’t hold him accountable for the vicious wound he’d suffered, effectively removing him from battle, that he’s one of the bravest men, let alone dwarves she’s ever met, that if he was reckless he was reckless for his familly and they wouldn’t have made it out of the Elvin stronghold much less this far without him - instead of telling him a whole bunch of sensible, true things that wouldn’t do a thing to help him feel better, she gave him what he needed.

“Technique,” she explained.

“what? What’s wrong with my technique?” He sounded both surprised and put-out and Tauriel’s smile flickered across her face.

“Take your stance.” She orders. Kili strangely enough, doesn't question her, just obeys even though he’s a little surprised that an elf, and Thranduil’s captain of the guard no less is actually about to give him some pointers.

Tauriel is circling him, her eyes noting every detail, every tiny aspect of his stance. Its… distracting. As much as he likes the idea of her watching him, it makes him super-self conscious and hyper aware of his own body. He lifts his head higher, straightens his back, tenses the muscles in his arms and tries not to wonder if she likes what she sees. Worse yet, her steady circling draws his gaze like a moth to flame. He loves to watch her moving, loves the way she walks like silk sliding through fingers, like water slipping through stone, with a liquid fluidity that almost makes her seem like she’s gliding… He’s watching her again. He blinks, trying hard to focus on the target in front of him…only to have his eyes slide back to her.  
Focus…slide, focus…slide, focus…slide…stay. Dammit Kili.

There’s another smile forming at the corners of her mouth when she tells him, without taking her eyes off the position of his feet, “focus on the tree Kili, not on me.”

“Right. Yes. sorry.”He flushes and quickly tears his gaze from her beautiful form barely an arm’s length away and fixes it on his target.

Her eyes flicker to his then and unless he’s very much mistaken, there’s something very amused and very pleased about the way she’s looking at him. Kili quickly arrests his thoughts and tightens his grip on his bow. Focus, he tells himself sternly.

“okay, now, widen your legs a bit.” He does. “a bit more,” he does again.

“Killi, it is to lower your centre of gravity, to give you more stability when you’re shooting – one more time.” He opens his legs so wide he threatens to teeter backwards and fall on his ass.

Tauriel is chuckling as she steps closer. He tries his hardest to ignore her hands on his hips, her legs nudging his closed and then, her thigh sliding between his legs, to pull them slightly apart; His heart is tripping inside his chest.

“okay now, anchor your hand.”

“what?” he blurts out, still hopelessly distracted.

Another smile flickers over her face, “let your firing hand touch your mouth.”

Oh.

He does, feeling a little silly – he knew that..

“okay…” Tauriel steps in close behind him and shatters the little focus he’d managed to piece together. She smells of the forest; vanilla, pine and heady traces of something that makes him think of smoke and wildflowers. Its devastatingly alluring, as mysterious as she is, as subtly beautiful.

“You’re tense, relax” she murmurs. He’s too aware of himself and of her to but he tries, rolling his shoulders and giving himself a little shake. It works a little but when she leans in to cover the hand holding the bow with hers, her cheek just centimeters from his, her skin on his, her scent all around him and her breath on his neck. goose-bumps break out over his skin and he tenses again, this time with the effort of holding himself in check. For some strange reason, he wants to bite her, turn his head just a little, nuzzle his way up her neck, place his lips against the small hollow under her jaw and nip. Kili blinks hard and banishes the thought from his mind. Unaware of the impulses the dwarf in her arms is struggling with, Tauriel continues her instruction, “Now loosen this hand.” He does and her soft “good” makes him go warm.

“lower your arm” she places a hand on his shoulder, runs it down to his arm, pushing it gently down and Kili swallows hard, she’s completely focused on his technique, his proximity doesn’t seem to affect her at all; he wishes he could stay the same.

Her fingers linger on his arm and Kili takes a deep breath, long and slow. It’s his wound, or the fact that its midnight, or that the woman he thought he loved but would never see again is standing right behind him, but he’s feeling especially reckless tonight; wants to do all kinds of crazy things. Like turn and cover her mouth with his. Like run his fingers through the silky mass of her hair. Like interlock his fingers with hers and not let go this time. He thinks he’ll scare her away if he does any of the above and so draws a little harder on his arrow until he things he just might snap the bowstring and…focuses.

“now…” Tauriel glances at him, and trails off, almost losing her train of thought. He’s so close, so achingly close. She’s breathing in the air he’s breathing, feeling the warm solidness of him. He smells like the forest, like rich dark earth and like steel and she’s pressed against him, closer than she meant to be, her chest against his back, her arms around him, fingers on warm skin. There’s a rushing heat running through her, pooling In her lower belly that she doesn’t want to think about. Quickly she struggles to recover, “now aim,”

He does so, closing one eye to get a better target.

“and… fire” his fingers move at her command and the arrow hurtles beautifully through the air to embed itself, dead centre, almost completely in the trunk of the tree. Tauriel smiles fondly at the gasp of surprise he lets out.

“Again” she orders and a second arrow goes flying to split the first.

“oh my gods,” Kili mutters, still in shock. She rests her head on his shoulder, genuinely happier than she can remember being in a while. “Now how did that feel?” she asks.  
He’s laughing as he turns his head towards her. “Amazing!” He declares. She notices it at the exact same moment he does- that their faces are now barely centimeters apart. His eyes widen for a second and then darken. “It felt amazing” he murmurs again only now he’s staring at her lips instead of her eyes. Butterflies explode in her heart and stomach and Tauriel is almost alarmed by their intensity. She should move back, end it now before things go too far – she knows this- and yet all she does is whisper, “that’s good.” Her voice is huskier than she means it to be and she knows she’s in trouble because now she’s the one looking at his lips.

What would it be like to kiss a dwarf? What would it be like to kiss kili?

He must have been thinking along the same lines because he was slowly leaning closer to her. It crossed her mind, briefly,– the issue of legolas and orcs, dragons and duty. Then Kili’s nose brushes hers, sending tiny shocks throughout her entire body and she can’t help the way her eyes drift closed. His hand reaches upwards to smooth away strands of hair that have drifted to her cheek and it amazes Tauriel, as his thumb strokes down her face to brush across her bottom lip – how much a single touch can make her ache.

She’s leaning in too now; can’t help it and there’s something - something breathless and yearning and aching in this moment.

He wants to, gods he wants to but he’d never take advantage of a moment of vulnerability, doesn’t want this to be something she regrets.

“Tauriel?” he murmurs against her lips, so close, his lips are just barely brushing hers – a feather light touch that turns her response into a low murmur of want, “mmmh?”

“I’m going to kiss you now.” She stills. Kili freezes as well, terrified that he’s brought her back to her senses and she was going to do the very proper, decent elvish thing and leave.

Tauriel draws back, just enough so that she can look him in the eyes. Kili’s heart is racing in his chest. He thought he knew perfectly how beautiful Tauriel’s eyes were – he’s seen them in his dreams a dozen times since that night of starlight and fire-moons – but now, seeing them this close, he realizes that he had no idea – emerald green gems, touched with silver moonlight and flecked with gold around her irises. He’s waiting for her to leave which is why he receives the shock of his life when she leans in and gently nips his bottom lip, “so kiss me.” She murmurs.

Desire lances through him and his heart stutters, in gratitude - in disbelief, he doesn’t know, but he slides a hand underneath the heavy mass of her hair, cups her neck, and leans in. Their lips meet, lightly, briefly and break away tingling. Then there’s a moment of forehead’s resting against foreheads and panting breaths intermingling with panting breaths and then a surge, each toward the other, a passionate crush of lips against lips, Tauriel’s mouth opening under kili’s to deepen the kiss, Kili tangling his fingers through her thick long hair, pulling her as close as he can get and –

“hey Kili! Kili!” Fili comes bursting into the clearing and the two break apart as though ice cold water has been flung over them.  
As one they turn to face Kili’s brother in shock.

Fili runs up to them huffing and wheezing. He actually has to bend over to catch his breath but it doesn’t stop him from yelling, “where the bloody hell have you been, we’ve been looking for you all night! Thought you’d gone cuckoo and drowned yourself in the lake or something!” Fili launches himself forward and envelops Kili in a gigantic bear hug (gigantic for his size).  
Kili, acutely aware of the opportunity he lost, thinks of starlight, and mist, and smoky wildflowers on his tongue and is torn between returning his brother’s hug and wanting to throttle him. Tauriel, Tauriel is flushed and hot and bothered and actually drags her hand through her hair in a most un-Elvin-like manner. She doesn’t know if she’s more relieved or frustrated at the interruption. What she does know is that she’s trembling like a leaf; it’s too much all at once, Legolas leaving, choosing to stay, Kili and his warm fingers, warmer lips, “could she ever love me” and… realizing that the answer could be yes if it wasn’t already – she takes in a sharp breath, right on the edge of something like panic and Kili’s eyes snap to hers. she looks away, unable to take the concern she sees shining from them right now.

She had… kissed him. Maybe almost done a whole lot more and she….she had no idea how to classify that right now. Maybe ever.

She needed…to get away, to think.  
“well…it seems you’re in excellent hands I’ll be taking my leave.” She says quietly, ever polite.

Fili broke away from Kili, ready to protest, “What in the dead of the night like this, at least wait till morning. come, rest, you've done a lot to aid us tonight and we're in your debt. tomorrow we can give you some provisions at the very least before you continue on your way.” He nudges his brother, expecting him to add something but Kili’s arguments are in the soft, darkness of his eyes as he gazes at her; convincing arguments, persuasive arguments, arguments that bring a gentle red back into Tauriel’s cheeks.

“no, I’ll be fine. i….i just…there are a number of things I need to attend to.” She speaks to Fili but her eyes don’t leave Kili’s. A range of emotions sweeps across his face – hope and fear, disappointment and desire, understanding. When he gives her a small nod, she is grateful that he get's that she's...just not ready for all this yet.

It was a sign of her disturbed equanimity that she didn’t remember to use formal titles as she took her leave. “Fili” she said by way of goodbye, giving a small nod of her head. Her gaze shifts to his brother and those still dark eyes remind her of everything that had gone on between them. She gave him a small nod as well, “kili” his name came out far huskier than his brother’s. Kili swept into a low bow and it seemed to her that when he straightened, the black pools that were his eyes were even darker than before. “Tauriel.”

She really, really needed to leave before she did something she would regret.

Fili’s gaze travelled between the elf and his brother, taking in the weird vibes, their lingering stares, silent communication - the charged weight between them, incomplete suspicions forming as Tauriel took her leave. After waiting till she was a safe distance away, he leaned towards Kili and whispered, “Hey bro, I didn’t…uh…interrupt anything did I?”  
Kili stares flatly at him for a long second before smacking him upside the head.

“wha- But! She’s-” Fili spluttered incomprehensibly for a moment in utter indignation. “How was I – I thought you’d be alone you know. Never thought, well never expected –“ he was struggling to find a nice way of saying I never thought you’d be trying to make-out with an elf, the Captain of Thranduil’s guard no less but Kili shook of his clumsy explanation and hobbled as quickly as he could a little way forward.  
He could just see Tauriel, tall, and beautiful, reddish-brown hair looking like silver touched fire in the moonlight and he couldn’t resist, making sure, that he’d get a second chance at this, some way somehow.

“Tauriel” he called and watched her still so completely it was almost eerie. She turned, the movement like water and even across the expanse of the clearing, he could feel her eyes on his, feel her waiting, somewhere between amusement and apprehension.

“promise me that no matter what happens, today, or tomorrow, or the next, that before you leave for your homeland…you and I will try this again, without interruptions this time….i really need the practice.”  
He grins to complete the joke and take some of the weight of his words, sees a dozen emotions flicker across her face: surprise, amusement, hesitation, tenderness, fear until finally the corner of her lips turn upwards in the smallest smile. Its not a smile of promises, or of secrets, or even of moonlight kisses but it is a smile of maybe’s and almosts; It’s a smile of we’ll sees and as she calls back out to him, his heart twists in his chest at the idea of it, at the idea of a maybe.

“don’t get your hopes up dwarf.” She calls out she's only partly teasing.

He grins anyway, responds, “It’s inevitable, elf. I’ll be waiting.”

She gives him a quick look, speculative, serious

_Inevitable_

Then shakes her head and gives him a wave as she turns to disappear into the forest.

Killi watches her go, feeling as if he had finally caught a dream only to lose it anyway.

She was, so so close to him, but so so far. She walked in starlight and moonbeams, in silent beauty like the night. She was Healer of Dwarves, Destroyer of Orcs, Shooter of arrows, capturer of his heart. Could she ever love him? He had no idea but of one thing he was certain. Before the final battle, before the world ended in arrows, steel, blood, cries and death, he would find out.  And if she’d let him, after all this was over…he’d walk in starlight with her and never let her go.


	2. Choosing Killi

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the one where Tauriel saves Legolas, a girl can't get a break and Tauriel is willing to face a dragon for everyone's favorite 'taller than most' dwarf.

She’s almost too late to save him.

Tauriel tracked Legolas until she came to a narrow road, a swampy marsh as far as the eye could see on her left side and a large hill sloping up on her right. His horse was buried up to its neck in the marshland and tossed its head frantically, large eyes rolling in its head as it looked to and fro, snorting in terror. For a terrifying second, she thought Legolas had fallen in too until he comes jogging up with a long stick to reach his horse’s reigns so that he can begin the long, arduous process of helping it pull itself out. She’s just about to go and help him when the sound of a snapped twig catches her attention. Up on the hill, on a small shelf, an Orc is crouched behind a small boulder, an arrow already aimed at Legolas. She has just enough time to spur her horse forward and yell his name before the arrow is flying through the air and Tauriel is flying off her horse.

Legolas whirls around. He gets out a “wha-” before Tauriel comes crashing into him. There’s a stinging cut across her arm as the arrow slashes across it instead of embedding itself in Legolas’s head and then they’re both falling to the ground. Legolas is completely caught off guard but still instinctively wraps himself around Tauriel, twisting so that he reduces the impact of their fall. They roll a small way and Legolas ends up on top of her, eyes widening in understandable surprise when he realizes that he suddenly has a panting, slightly flushed Tauriel underneath him. “hello” he blurts out, because it’s the first thing that comes to mind. “Hi” she returns quickly then rolls them over before Legolas can take another breath. She spots the orc and in one smooth movement, aims and fires. It gives a watery screech as the arrow buries itself in its throat and crumples to the ground.  
Only then does she let herself relax and breathe a sigh of relief. For a moment she forgets herself, letting her head drop in the hollow of his neck, overcome by the fact that he’s safe and he almost wasn’t and if she had come just a second later…

“Well… that was interesting.” Legolas says after a couple of seconds have passed. It was the smile in his voice that made her lift her head to give him a flat look of disbelief.

His smile slowly widens into a grin, “I believe that’s the second time I owe you my life these past few days. You’ve saved me again Tauriel.”

His eyes are twinkling, actually _twinkling_ at her. He appears so untouched by the would be assassination attempt that she struggles between wanting to fling her arms around him and wanting to box him on the ears, knowing that neither was acceptable.  
“You were careless,” she says instead, frowning at him. “if the orc you were chasing hadn’t killed you, this one would have and if this one hadn’t, clearly, by the looks of your horse, the terrain would have. You were _careless,_ Legolas,” she admonishes again, the absence of her usual endearment making his name heavy on her tongue. His smile is gone, something like irritation growing in his eyes though his face has become as impassive as his father’s.

“Anything else?” he asks. And his voice is not quite cold but getting there. It irritates her. “Yes, actually.” But unexpectedly, instead of snapping at him, her voice cracks, her tone becoming soft, rough, “you almost died. I have lost everyone I have ever held dear to the Orcs. I would not lose you as well.”

Legolas’ expression softens as soon as he hears the wavering huskiness of her voice and now, he looks up at her somberly, remorse in his eyes. He tenderly tucks an escaped strand of her hair behind her ear before he murmurs, “ Amin hiraetha, Tauriel, Goheno nin. (I’m sorry Tauriel, forgive me), I wasn’t thinking clearly.”

She’s not expecting such a sincere apology and for a while, can only stare at him touched and a little amazed; They look so alike she sometimes forgets just how different from his father he truly is.

“Don’t do it again.” She makes herself say, trying hard to sound stern.

He smiles, already knowing he’s forgiven despite Tauriel’s rather impressive frown. “No, never.”

It takes her a while to notice – Legolas is firm and comfortable underneath her, their bodies a perfect fit. She’s recovering from surges of adrenaline and fear and relief and anger, and his smile is nice, fond, one of his hands stroking her cheek in a way that warms her. She’s comfortable and they’re having a moment which is why it takes her a while to notice that Legolas’s expression has turned amused, that his grin has returned. “Do you plan to lay on me for the rest of this day?” he asks with the twinkle back in his eyes and then she remembers that she _is_ still very much laying on top of her prince and oh gods if Thranduil could see them now!

She scrambles off of him and then tries not to look too flustered as she pretends to straighten her uniform and check her weapons all the while ignoring Legolas’s expanding grin.

“well, shall we get going then.” She says with as much dignity as she can, daring him with her eyes to say something. Legolas works to smother his smile, “after you.”

Before they could go anywhere however, they were interrupted by watery screeching from the fallen orc that sounded a lot like laughter. Legolas was in no mood to play games and would have happily kicked in its ribs to get it to talk but as sick as he was of Orcs, Tauriel was sicker. He’d thought she was bluffing when she pulled out her bow and aimed it between his legs but when she fired, her arrow landing just a centimeter below his crotch his sneer turned into an “eeep”. Tauriel smiled a wicked smile, and placed another arrow in her bow, while Legolas stared at her with a mix of amusement, admiration and wariness. “you were saying Orc?” she asked politely and quickly, the Orc began to talk.

That was how they ended up racing towards Laketown and towards the Elvin lands so that they could warn Thranduil and everyone else about the gigantic army that was coming their way. Thundering down the road, the long bridge that marked the entrance into Laketown just visible in the distance, they heard it before they saw it. A thunderous roar, louder than the charging yell of an army, louder than the deafening boom of two rock giants clashing, louder than anything they'd ever heard - the sound rung in their ears and Tauriel and Legolas jerked their horses to a stop at the same time. All around them a spray of fear rose and settled like mist, every living plant in the area at once apprehensive, agitated.

The hairs on Tauriel’s neck and arms prickled as she spotted it, a black dot in the distance, orange streaming from it in the night sky. She knew. She knew because her heart was hammering, and her throat was dry, and fear cupped her heart with cold, cold hands while dread welled up sickeningly in her stomach, she knew…but for some reason, she still needed to ask. “Legolas…is that – ”

“A dragon? Yes.” He finished grimly.

Damn it...

Kili…

***

“we have to go back.”

She was thinking aloud but Legolas jerked his horse around to stare at her in disbelief. “what are you talking about, we have to warn everyone at home, and possibly beyond. When that dragon is done with Lake-Town, it’ll come for us and apart from that, let us not forget the huge army of orcs amass– no? pray tell, what, exactly do you mean by no?” Legolas asked, understandably incredulous.

She’d been shaking her head numbly at him the entire time he was speaking and now she turned to him, her eyes this strange, desperate, chaotic mess of emotions that had him taken aback. “we have to warn them, the people of the town, they’ll be caught unawares, the dragon will wreck havoc, they might all die.” She swallowed, pushing down the horrible thought that surfaced. He might die – Killi might die.

Legolas stared at her silently, his expression unreadable, weighing her words, taking in her expression, that *look* in her eyes and then looked away, his decision made.  
“This is not our fight, Tauriel.” He said quietly, firmly. When she started to argue, he interrupted her, his eyes cutting back to hers, a cold blue that commanded silence. “no. you were right about before. About not letting darkness become stronger than us. You were right about that. You were right about the Orcs and about the dwarves - *that* was our fight. We fought, we won and you healed your little friend restoring all honor back to the woodland realm, you were right and we fought our fight but *this*,” he pauses and shakes his head gravely, “*this* is not our fight.”

He waits for her to argue some more but though Tauriel looks torn, no further argument is forthcoming. Legolas gives her a firm nod, his eyes sympathetic, believing she understands and agrees, then turns his horse so that they can continue on their way. She wants to argue, but she can’t. He’s right. This is not their fight.

“It’s my fight though.” She says softly and the way Legolas stills in her saddle she knows she’s in trouble, even before he turns back to her, eyes flashing fire. “Your fight?” he asks and his voice has gone a dangerous kind of quiet.

“My fight.” She affirms steadily even though her heart has started pounding.

He gives her that same unreadable stare, only his eyes revealing his displeasure and then he gets it, the way she can’t quite meet his eyes, the way she’s tensed up in her saddle, that strange look he’d seen in her eyes earlier -part desperation, part fear - the way she’s suddenly made up her mind to rush headlong into a fight she can’t possibly win after scolding him earlier for his carelessness…

“The dwarf?” he guesses, not really expecting a reaction.

Her head snaps to his and the sheer surprise on her face is enough confirmation.

“The dwarf?” he repeats, his disbelief escalating with his voice,“the *dwarf?*”

“Stop calling him that, his name is Killi” she says. He’s not shocked at her irritation, any elf would be irritated by the insinuation he‘s making – he’s shocked by the defensive edge, defending him, the dwarf.

She’s looking at him now and it’s *that* look in her eyes, slightly defiant, slightly embarrassed, very worried that makes him need to know. “Just exactly what do you feel for him anyway?” He asks quietly.

His question catches her of guard. She opens her mouth, closes it and gives him a look that’s both pleading and helpless and that – the fact that she doesn’t know what to call it, makes something inside him tighten because if it was nothing it would be nothing, and if it was something, it would have a name but not knowing what to call it was dangerous –it meant more than she was willing to admit, to herself or to him.

“you care for him,” he says slowly, surprised. And Tauriel’s face is like an open book. She seems almost as afraid of his words as he is and he can’t tell if she’s terrified that he knows or terrified because he’s right and she herself has no idea how to handle that - caring for a dwarf. Still it doesn’t change anything he’s said, just makes his words more pertinent.

“Legolas, please, understand – ”

“No.” he dismounts in a quick graceful movement and in three long strides reaches Tauriel’s horse. She has just enough time to look at him warily and ask “what are you do-” before Legolas’s hands are around her waist and he’s whisking her from her saddle.

She can’t believe he actually did that. He ignores her scandalized “Legolas,” and drags a hand through his long hair. It’s the most frustrated she’s ever seen him and the realization, that he really is worried, really is concerned takes all her growing irritation away even when he folds his arms and glares down at her, “you’re not going anywhere.”

“Legolas - ” she says gently, about to try to calm him down but he interrupts her again.

“I mean it.” He steps forward, glaring at her in a way that makes her nervous though she stands her ground. “I understand alright? You’re strong, fearless and good to your core. You probably fell down somewhere along our journey, cracked your head on a stone and hence the fascination with the dwarf” she blinks at him, but he doesn’t give her time to decide if she’s offended or amused when he grips her shoulders, fingers tight. “I get it, okay, I understand” and his voice is gentle again, like a caress and his hands, loosen on her shoulder’s giving her a gentle squeeze. They begin to run comfortingly up and down her arms but when they brush her wound, she winces and Legolas’s looks surprised, then furious when he sees the cut. It just goes to prove his point and his voice hardens. “But this is not a pack of thirty orcs, or even a hundred. This is a dragon. They will die and if you leave, you will die as well” she looks stunned back to her senses so he takes a step back, staring at her with grave, solemn, soft eyes. “you’re good and you’re brave and you’re *strong* and its part of why I love you but if you go, you will die and I. will. *Not*. Let. You. die.” He all but growls and she thinks this might be the fiercest she’s ever seen him.

She’s reeling and as he stares down at her waiting for an answer, she doesn’t think he even realizes what he’s said. She presses a hand to her stomach, trying to control the wave of emotion that washes over her, the fluttering, tries to remind herself to breathe. He’s waiting for an answer and all she can murmur is, “you love me?” her voice low and rough.

His own words surprise him and he stares at her with wide open eyes while Tauriel’s heart thrums in her chest.

She lets out a shaky laugh because she's obviously misunderstood. “like a sister right?”

He stares at her with soft, soft eyes and when he speaks her heart skips a beat but he agrees with her. “yes, like a sister.”

She nods, looks down and doesn't know whether the feeling threatening to overwhelm her is relief or disappointment but then he continues and it no longer matters.

“and like more.” Her gaze snaps upwards to meet his. “Tauriel I…” he struggles for a moment, not knowing exactly how to classify the tangle of feelings inside him, “I care for you, deeply.”

Her heart gives a weird little pulse at that, deeply…

“which is why I’m asking you,” and now he steps closer, far closer than the prince should be to a lowly silvan elf. “It’s why I’m asking you” his hands come up to cup her face and now, there’s this tingling warmth where his skin touches hers, “please don’t do this.”

They’re already close, very close, too close, but Legolas comes closer so that the length of her body is against his and she’s supposed to be answering him but she can’t focus, can’t think. Over five hundred years and nothing; The day she thinks she just might have feelings for a dwarf, a dragon appears, and a hord of orcs and goblins threaten to overwhelm the entirety of the Free Peoples and now, *now* he tells her he cares for her deeply!?

There’s a hand on her waist, bringing her closer so that she’s actually pressed against him and she, really, really can’t think. She keeps her eyes on his chest because she’s afraid of what he’ll say if she looks at him, what they’ll do.

“Look at me Tauriel.” He whispers. There’s still a kind of desperation coloring his tone and she can’t resist looking up because it’s a tone she’s never heard on Legolas, desperation, it’s a look she’s never seen. “please don’t go.”

Legolas eyes change color according to the time of day, according to his mood, sometimes blue, sometimes grey, and sometimes almost hazel. Now, they’re almost black. “please don’t go,” he murmurs again and its…not fair, when he’s looking at her like that, when he has one hand stroking her cheek and the other wrapped around her waist, its not fair, to ask her for something that she suddenly wants to do very, very much but…can’t. she wants to stay but she… can’t.

“Legolas” she means to tell him to step back, that he’s not allowed to hold her like this, that he’s the prince and there are lines not meant to be crossed except, there’s another look in Legolas eyes, one that actually makes her stop breathing – soft, intense, his gaze on her lips.

He’s leaning in. Tauriel’s heart skips a beat. “Legolas,” she murmurs again and it’s supposed to be a warning as much as it is a plea but it comes out too huskily to be much of either. she can’t gather the rest of the words, the rest of the “you shouldn’ts” and “we can’ts” and then it doesn’t matter because he’s kissing her anyway.  
Gently at first, sweetly and she’s caught, hopelessly, in the softness of his lips, their slow slide against hers, the warmth in his kiss, the surreality of this moment she’s wondered about a thousand times… his tongue against her bottom lip, the tremble that runs through her at the touch. She opens for him and Legolas deepens the kiss and its...nice. she's basking in them, the sensations he produces, his tongue against hers, his teeth nipping her bottom lip and then his mouth moving to suckle the sting away and it...feels good... pleasurable, nice but its not...its not what she thought it would be, after all these years...there are no fireworks...moonbeams...stardust; there is no ache, no burning, no desperate *need* to have him closer, kissing harder, holding tighter- he's doing all the right things with his hands and his mouth and her body responds, a slow spreading heat like the glowing embers of a fire instead of actual flames but this is not the stuff the love stories of legend are made out of. when she pulls away she does so gently, and Legolas rests his head against hers. The silence is filled with what they can’t take back. He holds her close and she likes that, the ease of it, the warmth of it, the comfort of it.

“Don’t go,” Legolas says again, quietly, “stay with me, let’s go warn the others –“

she's shaking her head before he can finish, stepping back out of his hold. “I’m not changing my mind Legolas.” She says softly and knows, by the way he stops, by the way his eyes shine with both pain and hurt that he knows she’ll still leave. “I’m sorry, I’m so so, sorry but I have to go.”

“you would die for him?” he asks, his voice wavering, rough.

There are tears gathering and its stupid she knows to cry about maybe having two men that might love her but in all the centuries that she’d known him, she’d never imagined this, having to hurt him to save someone else.

“You're my prince; I would die for *you*,” she whispers fiercely, but I…can’t lose him.”

He stares at her, eyes soft and she knows that whether he wants to or not, he understands.

“are you coming,” Tauriel asks him eventually, her heart heavy, needing to ask but already knowing his answer.  
Legolas slowly shakes his head at her, “I have to warn everyone else” His duty, allegiance, loyalty and every other part of him would always belong to his people first, the kingdom that would soon be his and her second – she knew it well, it was one of the things she admired most about him. “You know that no matter how much I want to, I can’t go. I can’t protect you. It’ll be just you and the handful of leftover dwarves... and the dragon.” He warned quietly.

“I know…I'm still going” She murmurs, her voice thick and because the way he’s looking at her just might break her heart, she turns away and moves towards her horse.

She’s almost made it, is just about to vault herself into her saddle when she feels warm strong arms encircle her from behind and Legolas chest is against her back, his head coming to rest on her shoulder, in the curve of her neck. It’s a final goodbye not an attempt to make her stay - she's already made her choice - and she closes her eyes against the rush of pleasure and pain that his holding her brings. She can’t do anything about the tears that slip down her cheeks now.

He kisses her – the softest kiss in the curve of her shoulder and then he’s letting her go. As he lowers his hands to his side, he links his first finger with hers. She looks down at them, more tears welling – he’s really more like Kili than he knows - and then she looks at him and Legolas gives her a small smile and uses his other hand to wipe the tears from her eyes. “Warriors aren’t supposed to cry. You're going soft”

His words earn a watery chuckle from her.

They stand for a moment more, their first fingers interlinked, the night quiet, a light breeze blowing through the air, heavy with the knowledge that no matter what she said, this really might be the last time they saw each other again. That there is a sense in which she is choosing Killi over Legolas who she's known for centuries, who she would die for and who would die for her, who's been everything to her for the longest time...

There are no stars.

Then Tauriel turns away.

The link their fingers make tightens as she takes a step and for a second she thinks he’ll pull her back instead of letting her go. Another step and…  
and Legolas relaxes his hand, lets her finger slide from his and this, that he cares about her enough to let her go touches her most of all.

“Be safe,” he whispers, eyes gentle and dark.

“You too.” She says softly.

Then she’s whirling her horse around and thundering towards Lake-Town.

For a while she lets her tears blur her vision, stream down her face and then she dashes them furiously away with the back of her hand so she can fix her eyes on the dragon, a much larger dot in the night sky, a stream of fire emitting from him. Renewed determination courses through her as she fixes her eyes on Lake Town in the distance and urges her horse to go faster.

Killi…

she was coming for him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alrighty! so this was originally intended to be just a one- shot but anddante and a couple of other's really got me thinking about expanding the story, so yay, there'll be five more chapters after this one. This chapter is largely Legolas/ Tauriel centric because i didn't want to have this huge question mark over her relationship with him. She grew up with Legolas so there is a sense in which she already loves him. There is definitely attraction there; he's who she's thought she's wanted for the longest time so there are sparks but killi is Killi and I'm me, so this fic is largely all about Kili and Tauriel and the undeniable magic in their relationship. i do believe, however that Legolas and Tauriel have a different kind of magic, which i'll be exploring more in following chapters (when he get's all protective, it makes me smile big silly smiles.)  
> The next chapter is called Inevitable battles (though this may change). its the one where Tauriel rides a dragon, becomes less confused and Killi kisses her in a sea of orcs. i can't give too much away about the following chapters because what fun is there in that? but expect some Legolas - killi bonding, a heck of a romance, tons of action, tears and a whole lot of fluff. comments and kudos are always welcome :)


	3. In the Silence

There’s something about the sudden entrance of an elf into your home (even if it’s not really yours and you’re only borrowing it for a day) that one finds rather shocking, especially if you’re Kili and it’s a tall, very beautiful, very accomplished elf who you thought left hours ago after making you feel all kinds of yearning, knee-weakening, heart melting, stomach fluttering things you never knew it was possible to feel all at one time, all for one woman.

It explains why when she enters you freeze in the middle of dodging a bread roll from your brother so that it bounces off your head and onto the floor. It explains why Bofur freezes in the act of taking a spoonful of soup, why Oïn pauses in adjusting his hearing aid and why Filli turns into a statue, arm upraised and armed with another roll. Eight pairs of wide dwarven eyes take in her entrance and if at first, Tauriel seems a tad bit uncertain with the attention, her eyes soon find yours and she steps forward looking like she has something very important to say. As all the air rushes out of your lungs, you have to remind yourself to breathe. You stand without thinking about it and then find yourself smiling as she comes nearer the dining table.

“hey,” you say and your voice is just a little too bright, a little too happy. You remind yourself to play it cool because one kiss in a moonlit forest did not a courtship make. “I thought you were leaving.” And now you sound better, just the right hint of pleased but curious.

Tauriel, on the other hand, looks quite worried and your smile slips away when you note that she seems tired, worn. That there’s dirt on her uniform and a cut on her arm, dried blood visible through the slit in her sleeve. That her eyes are rimmed with pink and it looks like she’s been crying. She looks pleased to see you too though and that - that makes you feel like goo.  
She starts to say something but is interrupted by a cheerful Fili who’s recovered from the surprise of her arrival. “Changed your mind about the meal, have you? Have a seat, its not much, but its better than adventuring on an empty stomach.”  
As if to prove his point, Bofur abandons his spoon and lifts the bowl to his lips, draining the last few mouthfuls before setting it down with a satisfied sigh.  
“You’re reminding me of Bombur you know.” Filli tells him and Bofur looks aghast, “what, Bombur!?” quickly he checks himself for new mysterious rolls of fat and finding none, humph’s at Filli who grins and then turns his attention to you,

“well don’t be a lout, pull out a chair for her.”

You immediately start to, feeling a little silly that you hadn’t thought of it before but Tauriel gently stops you with a hand on your arm. “oh no, I won’t be staying, I just have to –“

“won’t be staying!?” this outburst comes from Oïn who up until this moment had been fiddling with his hearing aid trying to get it just right, “nonsense, you need some meat put on your bones you do. Elves, with their leafy green stuff, no wonder you’re all so skinny,”

“Hey she’s exactly the right size” you speak up, because you won’t tolerate any suggestion that she’s not, “In fact she’s perfect” you go so far as to assert and when you glance at Tauriel you’re surprised but pleased to find her blushing lightly. You would smile but Fili’s sly voice drags your attention away, “oh, I bet you think so, don’t you brother,” he teases and winks and you chuck a bread roll at him which he ducks and retaliates with two cheeses.

There was all the promise of an all out brawl brewing if Tauriel hadn’t clapped her hands loudly and shouted, “hey!” over the growing din.  
Once more everyone freezes in their places and she looks at each and every one of you, torn between disbelief and amusement. “I have something to tell you.” She’s finally able to get out.  
You are all cautious at first, and then embarrassed under Tauriel’s steady gaze as you put down plates and cheeses and breads to listen to what she has to say.  
***  
Bofur’s exclamation of “THEY WOKE HIM UP!?” is deafening and echoes the expressions of those around the table. “FOR THE LOVE OF THE ARKENSTONE, YOU SEND THEM IN FOR A JEWEL AND THEY COME BACK WITH A DRAGON!?”

“Except they’re not back yet, are they?” Fili observes gravely and a hush descends on the table, all their moods plummeting at once.

Kili is the first to snap out of it, stepping up next to Tauriel and looking around him with determined eyes, “They’re probably on their way; it’ll just take them a while to get here is all. Until then, we have to make sure we –”

“Don’t die?” Bofur interjects helpfully.

“Yes…but also that we get the townspeople out alive. Here’s what we’re going to do.” Everyone, even Fili, leans in to listen.

Silently, you watch him rattle of the plan he’s just formulated, focused, intense, selfless in his desire to save as many of the people of Lake Town as possible. It’s a side of him you've never seen, a side that doesn't coincide with the bright eyed, taller than most dwarf who’d tried to entice you into discovering the great mysteries hidden in his trousers and despite everything that’s happened, how tired you are, how long a night it’s been, you find yourself smiling slightly as your respect for Killi ratchets higher.  
It’s interesting, that you find yourself liking both sides of him equally – the playful and silly, the serious and determined. You take a moment, just… liking him, and then he turns to you with a question in his eyes and you step forward to join the table in making their plans.

***  
Fili and Bofur have gone to wake up the townspeople and warn them about the dragon. You start to follow them when Tauriel places a hand on your chest, effectively halting you. You raise a questioning brow, though pleased at the contact.

“You’re not going anywhere till we dress your wound.” Tauriel explains firmly and when you look at Oïn for support, the older dwarf only comes to stand by her side and crosses his arms. Together, they form a solid wall blocking your way. “I’m sorry lad, but we’ll have to have a look.”  
Outnumbered, you concede defeat gracefully, though you mock pout at Tauriel as you move towards your seat. The corner of her mouth tilts upwards and you would grin but you can’t hold back a wince as pain twinges through your knee. You quickly smooth your expression when Tauriel looks worried but you know you’re not fooling anybody.  
Oïn makes quick work of the old bandage, looking somewhat worse for the wear with your journey into the forest and lets it fall to the ground. Tauriel looks pleased to note that Oïn had stitched the wound closed but it is still largely unhealed though a great deal more healthy looking - it was no longer black for one, or weeping, just an injured red with the skin around it an ugly shade of purple. Oïn let out an approving grunt and gives Tauriel a warm smile as he shuffles off to gather new dressing for the wound. “a good bit of healing that.” He compliments as he disappears round a corner.

You suddenly realize that for now at least, you’re alone in the room with Tauriel.

And for the life of you, you can’t seem to take your eyes off her. It takes a moment for her to sense your gaze and when she turns, you think its like looking directly at the sun. You’re not blinded but you are dazzled and you’re sure that even after she finally does leave, you’ll have her image imprinted behind your eyelids, her after-impression always in your line of vision, her shadow at the corner of your eye – you can’t look away and there’s something in her eyes, something a little scared, a little sweet, a little vulnerable that has your heart racing.  
Before either of you can say anything however, Oïn comes bustling in and you break eye contact at the same time, the moment lost. It's maddening.

Only the jar of alcohol Oïn is carrying can rip your mind off of Tauriel.

“Got to keep the wound clean lad,” he explains in response to your grimace. “It’s going to hurt like Mordor for a little while so here.” He hands you an old belt and after some hesitation, you slide it between your teeth. The leather is rough and bitter on your tongue but before you can really start worrying about what is going to happen, Tauriel moves beside you and slips her warm hand into yours. There is just enough time for you to look at her and smile, for her to gently squeeze your hand, and then Oïn pours the alcohol on your wound and the world explodes in a white-hot flare of pain.

***  
There are tears in Kili's eyes when it's over and Tauriel is moved to ask Oïn to let her fix the bandage. She hates just being a spectator when he’s in pain. The older dwarf appears a little flustered. She's already proven herself to be quite adept at healing but a dragon was coming and this was Thorin Oakenshield’s nephew. He really couldn’t afford any mistakes made – especially not by an elf of all things; Thorin would kill him…  
“Please.” Tauriel adds softly and despite himself the old dwarf is charmed by her voice, the gentle plea in her emerald green eyes. He glances at Kili who nods and gives him a pained smile.  
still, he hesitates for a second more before handing Tauriel the bandage with a gruff, “oh well alright, I’m going then. Don’t kill him, no matter how much you might be tempted to” Kili’s “hey!” makes a smile flicker across her lips. “I won’t” she promises.

Still hesitant to leave, Oïn backs away slowly and as Tauriel moves to take his place, sinking onto both knees to reach Kili’s leg, he can’t help reminding her –  
“Tie it tightly but not – ”  
“Too tightly” Tauriel finishes for him, a small smile hovering on her lips. She’d done this kind of thing before.  
Oïn gave an approving grunt, looking rather impressed and moved once again towards the door.  
Before he passed through it however, he did pause for a moment, looking back at the odd pair – the beautiful elf and Thorin’s injured nephew - with curiosity in his eyes. The way she rested a reassuring hand on his good knee and then began to wrap his wound, firmly but gently, gently… and the way Kili looked at her when he thought she couldn’t see – his eyes twinkling…soft, a smile on his lips for no apparent reason…  
Could they…  
No…  
surely not...  
Oïn gave himself a little shake and told himself to stop being so ridiculous.  But the image and his suspicions stayed with him long after he left and shut the door quietly behind him.  
***  
Now they were truly alone.

The realization creates a tingling awareness she does her best to ignore.

The small fire crackling merrily in the fireplace is the only sound in the entire house...

She tries to focus on just his bandage, but every so often, she can’t help sneaking a peek at him from under her lashes. He's looking down at her with melting dark eyes and a small smile that seems to grow each time she catches his eye and somehow, even though neither of them have said anything, even though there is a dragon coming, the space between them grows warm, heavy, the silence suddenly filled with memories of moonlit forests, Tauriel’s arms around him, his lips on hers, his hands and –

 _could she ever love me_ -

The silence is filled with all these things and more and by the time she ties the final knot on Kili's bandage and sits back to look at him her breathing is unsteady. There’s heat spreading through her, around her, thick and slow like honey and She can see it in his eyes that the silence speaks to him too.

Dimly, she realizes that her heart has started that mad tattoo it only beats around him and It amazes her, how much he can affect her without needing words. The moment stretches, lengthens, tautens and then Tauriel looks away and it breaks like a snapped thread.

She lets out a small shaky laugh to take up the space where silence was and stands, trying to ignore the fact that he’s made her knees weak.

Kili is still staring at her with this steady, soft gaze like he knows there’s still a part of her that’s scared by just how strong this thing between them really is. That, the idea that he can see all the things she _isn't_ saying, makes her stomach flutter. It unsettles her more than she can say.

Trying to sound as normal as possible she clears her throat and tells him to “Try to walk around on it; you need to get used to the pain as quickly as possible.”

Her ordering him about makes the corner of his mouth tilt upwards.

He wants to talk about what just happened, she knows, but for now, he lets it go. On the first circuit around the room, he limps badly, wincing with each step and worry rises in her like a high tide, till it floods her eyes. When he makes it back to her she makes him go around a second and a third time until his limp is not nearly as pronounced and he can at least walk without making faces. When she orders him to jog on the fourth circuit, to her surprise, his face breaks into a wide grin as he complies.

“What?” she asks, bemused.

Somehow, he manages to sound completely scandalous when he says “Nothing...I just love it when you get all bossy”  
He winks at her, and Tauriel tosses a bread-roll at him - which he dodges with a chuckle - she can’t help the dusting of red across her cheeks, even as she tells him to “just keep running Kili”. He notes the blush with a grin and then focuses on not letting his leg buckle underneath him.

It takes two tries before he can make an entire circuit without stopping and when he does, Tauriel is delighted. She grins at him and he returns it. For a while they stand, mutually enjoying the other’s presence but then Tauriel remembers the silence, and its penchant to whisper things she would rather leave unsaid until she can fully figure them out. So she tries to take her leave.  
“well…” she says, looking down at her feet, shuffling in a way that was uncommon for most elves, “I guess I’d better be – ”

“I can’t stop thinking about you.”

Tauriel’s head jerks up, her mouth frozen around the last word. She almost thought she’d heard him wrong but the way he was looking at her...she swallows hard and just like that, silence flows to fill the house once more. It surrounds them completely.

All she can feel is the sudden rapid pounding of her heart.

“I’ve tried.” He continues softly, his eyes sinking into hers, “when we left the woodland realms, I thought I would never see you again. I was too scared to even hope but then you showed up in Lake-town and having you here…has been like a dream and I’m terrified that at any moment I’m going to wake up. I kissed you and you kissed me back and I can’t stop thinking about you.”

_I can’t stop thinking about you either._

She doesn't say the words but heat pools in her cheeks all the same and Killi notes it - her reaction to him - and feels the hope he is trying so hard not to acknowledge rise.

“See that, “he says, indicating the rosy hue of her skin, her darkened eyes “that makes me think I’m not crazy, that you do feel something for me. But right now, it’s almost like we’re pretending nothing happened– ”

“We’re not pretending nothing happened.” She interrupts him softly, her voice like rough silk and her heart thudding heavy in her chest as she holds his gaze.

“No?” he asks, sounding both hopeful and frustrated. There’s something so intensely vulnerable about him in this moment that Tauriel feels everything inside her melt.

“no,” she confirms gently, “I… it’s just, a lot. I wasn’t expecting…to feel so much for you so quickly. I….” she struggles with the words for a moment and then shrugs helplessly, dragging a hand through her hair. She’s struggling - to put how she feels into words; hates feeling so overwhelmed and confused and vulnerable. In the past six hundred years she can’t remember the last time she’s had to explain the way she feels to anyone and now she bites her lip against the words rising up inside her until Kili prompts her with a gentle, “Tauriel” and she finds herself blurting out, “I don’t know what to do. There are so many reasons why we shouldn’t let this go any further, why we can't - ”

“But the most important reason why we should and can – I care about you. More than you know. Beyond reason or logic, sense or propriety, I care about you. And I’m pretty sure you care about me too. Or else you wouldn't be here in the first place.” He whispers, waiting for her to deny it.

She doesn't. She can't.  Tauriel is melting; her heart skipping beats after “I care about you”. She wishes that being together could be as simple as caring about each other but she needs to think.  Plan. Talk to Thranduil, Legolas – the full might of both their kingdoms could come crashing down upon them -

“I really have to go –”

“I want to kiss you again.”

For the second time, Tauriel freezes in her tracks. 

A smile flickers across his face at her expression but his eyes are earnest, intense as he starts towards her with slow, purposeful steps. “I’m going to kiss you again,” he says with absolute certainty, “and this time, there’ll be no interruptions.”

Her blood is liquid heat singing through her veins.

She looks for some sign he’s joking but Kili is completely serious as he approaches her with intent.

“Kili…” she’s trying to go for a deterrent but her voice lacks conviction. She remembers that kiss - remembers his hands and the warm press of his mouth -but most of all remembers it being interrupted, thinks about it not being interrupted now. Her breathing speeds up in response but she’s still struggling for reason as he nears her “There’s a dragon coming…”

She takes a step backward for each of his steps forward.

“mmm…” he confirms unperturbed, his gaze never wavering.

“And anyone could walk in”

She shifts a chair so that it's between him and her but that just makes kili smile as he shifts the chair away.

“I don’t care” he counters softly.

“we need to think about this.”

“It’s all I've been thinking about.”

She bumps into the edge of a table and can't move backward any further. Kili sees this and his smile is back, soft and amused. He's still moving closer.

Her heart races faster with his every step, desire and panic rising further in her with every breath. “you and I…” she’s trying to tell him that they’re complicated and there’s more to the customs of her people than he knows but she loses her words somewhere between the look in his eyes and the hard, fast rhythm of her own heart. Her mouth goes dry as he steps up close, so close, there’s almost no space between them.

“kili…” she’s falling into the soft darkness of his eyes despite herself, even knowing that the part of her that’s going to be able to walk away from all this untouched is slipping away, and if she kisses him, she might never be able to get it back. His hands drift down to settle on her hips and when he pulls her gently to him all the air in her lungs escapes in a soft rush.

There are a thousand different things she wants to say but words have deserted her.

“Stop fighting what you feel. Stop running from it. Just...let go.” he challenges softly. Again he gives her a chance to respond but when all Tauriel does is stare at him with wide, dark, eyes he stretches upwards on his tiptoe and leans closer…and she… stops breathing, her eyes drifting shut...

His nose nuzzles against hers, his mouth hovering - temptingly, maddeningly close -

Its all he can do not to kiss her senseless for both their sakes but he’s waiting for her to say yes - with her voice, with her lips - would never take something that she doesn't want to give.

“Well?” he murmurs softly and Tauriel surrenders with a soft moan, tangling her fingers in his shirt and dragging him closer–

The door bursts open and slams against the wall and they jerk away from each other, turning to the entrance with wide, startled eyes.

“Kili, its done, everyone’s ready, we have to…” Bofur is standing in the doorway and his excited report trails off as he becomes aware of the shocked looks of the two inhabitants. They quickly mask their expressions but he’s still getting weird vibes from them. A long awkward moment passes before Bofur pushes his thoughts out of his head and begins rattling off his report again – there was a dragon coming, this was no time to be making silly assumptions! “We’re ready whenever you are.” He finishes and then quickly disappears back the way he had come.

Then Kili and Tauriel release identical sighs of relief which turn into full-out laughter when they catch each other’s eye. When the laughter dies down, Tauriel wipes a tear from the corner of her eye while kili stands smiling at her.

It was an absent observation, a stray thought, Tauriel's whispered, “you know, I just don’t understand what you do to me.” But it sobered them both.

They think about that for a second, quiet before Kili murmurs, “Well if it’s any consolation… I don’t quite understand what you do to me either, so we’re even.”

And despite everything, despite the fact that in a very real way, her feelings for him are shaking the foundations of her world and everything she knows to be right and acceptable, Tauriel still finds herself smiling at that. “yes…yes perhaps we are.”

He moves around, packing a couple of things together and then he goes to the doorway and turns towards her, holds out his hand.

“Are you staying?” he asks softly.

Here, with me.

It is such a simple question and yet so complicated at the same time – there was no coercion, no pleading, no attempt to keep her there. He acknowledged that she could leave, and she knew she probably should because once again, she was done here. Kili was alright and she should be by her King’s side as captain of the guard as he decided what he’d do about both the dragon threat and the Orc threat… and yet… and yet…

And yet…

She only hesitates for a second before she steps forward and takes his hand – threads her fingers through his – warm fingers, strong fingers. When she looks up she catches the smile on his face, in his tender brown eyes.

Yes...  
For as long as she could, she was staying.

With him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hellloooo :) so its been forever, right guys? i'm sorry it took so long getting these uploaded, a combination of exams, college applications, a school musical and no internet at home means life's been crazy these past couple of weeks but i'm back and i can't wait for you to see how this story turns out. the scenes have just been playing over and over in my mind and i'm dyiiing to share;)  
> anyhoo, this was originally one long chapter which i broke into two parts. Chapter 5 is the final battle and...well...you'll see...  
> comments are always welcome, hope you enjoy reading :)
> 
> ThisisMyVoice


	4. The One Where Everything Burns

They found the bard on a final search for the city, making sure no one had been left behind.

Tauriel sliced open the padlock to the door and he’d come streaking out, grabbing Kili’s shoulders as he told him quickly all the details of the black arrow and Kili and Tauriel shared a glance because that changed things. Smaug could be killed and if they had to, they'd be fighting instead of running.

“Go and get it,” kili told him, “we’ll get everyone out of here.” He glanced at Tauriel for confirmation and she gave him a small nod. The bard had paused stunned that they, especially the dwarf after everything that had happened would be willing to risk his life for the people of Laketown and then he squeezed first Kili’s, then Tauriel’s hand in gratitude before he dashed off to find the arrow.

 

***

  
They almost make it.

The entire town of Laketown hurries towards the docks when the dwarfs spread the news of the dragon. Only one or two young men stay behind, to ring the alarm bell when smaug is spotted. Families group together, Mothers and father’s carrying the younger children in their arms, on their backs, holding tightly onto the hands of the older ones. The younger men, free and unburdened fall back to help the elderly and young women escape with as much of their wealth as they can, hasty knapsacks stuffed with clothes, coins hidden in shoe’s, pants, hats and a dozen other places. No one can afford to pack everything but everyone leaves with something, a little food here, a little water there, a number of treasured possessions there. It’s a group effort, with the dwarves at the sides and back, making sure no one gets left behind and the people don’t panic, ushering them forward quickly but calmly and they really, almost make it.

They’re at the waterfront and they can spot the boats tied along the docks when the dragon plummets from the sky with a furious screech that has people shouting in pain and terror, clasping their hands to their ears as some drop to the ground. He opens his mouth and breathes out a huge jet of fire that creates an orange wall of flame in front of them. There’s a bubbling hiss as the lake boils and steam rises into the air like mist, clouding their vision. But the burning dock and the burning boats are clear enough.

Fili gives the order to turn around, yelling over the dismayed wails of the people and the sound of the dragon’s wings. He can barely hear himself but they understand regardless, following him as he takes the lead and breaks into a sprint and if they wanted to avoid chaos before, there’s no avoiding it now as frightened screams pierce the air and people break into full out runs. Smaug, hovering over the water, lets out another giant burst of fire, a line of flame that eats up the dock as fast as they run from it. The screaming and the cries and the shouting are deafening and the smell of burning fills the air. When Bofur sees a little girl stumble and fall at the point the dock ends, he curses and doubles back, jerking her up into his arms. When he turns he can see the dragon, huge and terrible, ruby red scales reflecting the flames, then the dragon opens his mouth and his vision is filled with fire. He has the presence of mind to turn and run, curving protectively around the child but the heat is still white- hot around him, nearly unbearable.

He doesn’t stop running until he’s back within the outskirts of the town and then, when he hands over the child to her grateful father, and sobbing mother and turns to look back, he can see Smaug, swooping to and fro across the lake, destroying every last chance of escape. The flames dance on the surface of the water and in the dark night, its absurdly beautiful, like the lake itself is on fire.

They planned to escape from the other side but only manage to reach the town’s center before the huge shadow of Smaug sweeps over them, the dragon himself coming to settle with a loud thump on the Big house. The people skid to a halt, shocked gasps, wails, screams sounding. The dragon stretches to his full height, his wings fully outspread, a predatory gleam in his eyes as he looks down at the people of Laketown. It’s a sight that strikes awe and terror in even the bravest hearts.

“I finally have you now,” he crows malevolently and begins to chuckle darkly. “what, you thought you could escape me? You thought you could send those stupid dwarfs” he spits out the word with unspeakable hatred, his voice rising in anger, “to steal my gold, my treasure!?” his voice thundering down at them, shakes with rage and the people are trembling. Several of them drop to their knees and begin pleading. The dragon chuckles evilly and steps down from the house, his claws leaving boulder sized holes. When he lands on the ground, it is with a thump that shakes the earth.  
“it’s too late for pleading, people of Laketown. You should have thought of that before you crossed me. Which each word he came closer until he was not but a few feet in front of the people who shrunk back in terror as Smaug’s huge form loomed over them, his voice booming and terrible, “I am Smaug the great! I am smaug the destroyer! I *am* death and the only king that rules under the mount -”

A stone goes whistling through the air and strikes him square on the side of his face. “Hey ugly – ” a voice yells.

The silence is absolute as the dragon slowly swings his head around.

When his eyes fell on the dwarf standing defiantly behind him they narrowed into slits and his whole body trembled with unspeakable rage. “you” he hissed.

“Me,” Filli said steadily, staring the dragon right in the eyes.

“and just exactly, who do you think you are.” The dragon enquired slowly, voice deadly quiet, forgetting about the people and turning to face the dwarf who stood as tall as a dwarf could stand, his sword strapped to his side.

“Fili, Nephew of Thorin Oakenshield, Prince of Durin and next in line to the throne. I’m the dwarf that’s going to kill you” he pointed his sword at Smaug, “for everything you’ve done to our people and our home.”

His words rung out in the silence, Smaug completely still.

Bofur and Oïn chose that moment to rush to Fili’s side, weapons at the ready and the scene reminded the dragon so much of his earlier run in with Thorin that he threw back his head and let out a furious roar that threatened to split the very sky in two. They clasped their hands to their ears with groans but even with that the air seemed to vibrate with the power of the sound. Bofur dragged Filli’s hand from his ears long enough to shout over the din, “you know now might be a good time to –”

Smaug went suddenly quiet and he lowered his great head fixing slitted eyes on the dwarfs. All at once, his scales began to glow.

“I know” Fili finished the stunned Bofur’s sentence, “RUN!”

As one they turned and fled as the dragon spewed a wave of fire right behind them. It was only ducking into a narrow alley that saved them from incineration. As they stood panting against the wall of a house, they watched the flames shoot past.

It takes a second and then two and all the dwarfs are chuckling weakly, sinking back against the wall as the dragon shrieks in fury. They can hear the flapping of his wings as he soars over the town, the jets of bright flames he releases. “Where are you, cowards!” he roars, “show yourselves!”  
“well? Now what oh fearless leader,” Oïn asks drily and Fili grins, despite himself and the unsteady thrumming of his heart.

“Kili and Tauriel are with the bard, looking for the black arrow. Oïn you get the people to safety somehow. Bofur and I will distract the dragon, keep him on this side of town and give them enough time to find it, got it?”  
They all got it but there was one itsy bitsy teeny tiny, niggling, little thing that was bugging Bofur and had been bugging him since earlier this evening and really, he just had throw it out there or he might burst –

“So Kili and the elf then?” Bofur blurted and then immediately clasped both hands over his mouth, wide eyed.  
Bad enough he’d suggested such a thing; what was worse was that nobody was denying it. Fili exchanged a covert glance with Oïn and Bofur’s mouth dropped open scandalized. _“really?_ I mean I was just _-really?_ \- Killi and the elf!?”

“We don’t know anything yet – ” Oïn started carefully,

“But they seem rather…” Fili looked at Oïn and tried to find a way to put it.

“Friendly.” They decided at the same time.

Bofur let out a snort of disbelieving laughter, thoroughly amused. “oh is that what we’re calling it.”  
His laughter quickly faded into a wracking cough under Fili’s flat gaze. Oïn just shook his head at them and then clapped his hands decisively, a wicked gleam in his eyes.

“well boys, let’s get this party started then.”

***

In the end, she tells herself she did it because she had no choice.

She and the bard were working their way up the houses, towards that solitary peak atop which the ancient crossbow sat. When she’d pulled herself onto the roof, while the bard started the perilous process of jumping from rooftop to rooftop, Tauriel looked towards the center of the town and what she saw took her breath away.

Hovering over the flaming body of laketown was smaug, huge and terribly magnificent under the night sky, his glowing scales the colour of blood and streams of fire erupting from his mouth as his wings beat the smoky air. The town was lit up like a huge bonfire, orange, red and gold flames reaching up into the night sky, turning it red, ashes and sparks dancing up to the heavens in a savagely elated celebration of the dragon’s destruction. The others were keeping him occupied - swooping to and fro, beating his great wings as he roared for them to come out - the mighty beast threw his head back in what can only be described as a howl, a great wave of fire bursting forth so that it seemed as if he had lit the very heavens ablaze in retribution. It was only a matter of time before he would find them; only a matter of time before the flames would spread.  
Tauriel watched, awed until Kili gently touched her hand and she could see that he was watching the dragon too, his expression unreadable, his eyes reflecting flames.

“C’mon,” he urged her gently and they continued the climb.

In the end Tauriel was right; It wasn’t long before he noticed them at all. In fact, as tongues of fire fell in burning streaks from the sky and Smaug lowered his great head, looking to and fro, he spotted them almost immediately, figures around the steep side of the tower, and with a great screech swooped towards them.  
It happened in a flash really; Killi yelling for the bard to hurry, Tauriel telling him that they needed a distraction, him looking at her and understanding in a flash what she meant but still not able to stop her from whirling around and running *towards* the dragon. He yells out her name but it makes no difference because she’s already leaping across rooftops. Smaug swoops down, snapping at her and Tauriel has to fling herself on her stomach to avoid being gobbled up.

He doubles back and lands with a thud that shakes the entire house and Tauriel leaps to her feet, craning her neck up till she and smaug are eye to eye. Her heart is hammering in her throat. She thinks he might be about to say something when without warning, his head shoots towards her. Tauriel dodges to her left, losing her footing as smaug tears off the entire side of the building. Before she can stand his head flies towards her again, jaw gaping and Tauriel rolls right.

Smaug hisses at her, steam curling from his nostrils. She has just one second to think about how she could be back at the woodland realms *right* this very instant and then smaug’s head comes flying towards her and Tauriel rolls backwards and onto her feet. He takes out the entire section of the house before her ,wood falling with a thunderous crash. She takes a split second to tell herself not to do it and then dashes forward anyway and leaps onto the dragon’s still lowered head. She runs up his neck, slides down to its base and holds on tight, pressing her hands to her ears in anticipation.

Even then, the dragon’s roar is deafening. “HOW. DARE. YOU. HOW DARE YOU, HOW DARE YOU PRESUME TO RIDE ME!!”  
If he was furious before, terrible before, Smaug’s anger borders on madness now as with a great leap, he unfurls his wings and carries them up, up into the sky.  
Pumping his great wings, Smaug accelerated faster than anything Tauriel had ever thought possible. she was crouched down against his hard scales, holding on for dear life as the wind and the steep ascent threatened to tear her off and fling her into the sky… she dug her nails into invisible handholds between his scales, hanging on until they were so high that the tower looked like nothing more than a small circle, killi, filli and the bard dots on it -

So high, that the sky had gone from red to black again and she could see the moon huge and bright in front of her -

So high that her heart stuttered in her chest and it became hard to breathe and the entire world seemed to fall away till there was nothing but the heavens –

Then Smaug leveled out and she had a second of blessed relief.

A second to catch her breath -

A second to rest– her screaming muscles -

No second of warning, before with a howl he drew his wings against his body and plummeted into a steep dive. She’s screaming she knows and all her focus is on not hurtling off as the wind tears through her hair and stings her skin and the sky rushes past. The wind claws at her open eyes so she shuts them tight. She cries out as Smaug does a sharp spin in the air in an attempt to dislodge her, except this time she thinks it might be a sound of delight.

Orcs were one thing, spiders and dealing with other petty disturbances of the kingdom another but this, _this_ was a dragon, A dragon! And she was loving every terrifying minute of it.

She felt it coming a split second before it happened but when Smaug suddenly spread out his wings -halting his descent with a powerful jerk - she was still wrenched off her seat and flung forward, hurtling sickeningly into empty, empty, air…

The wind tears at her hair, her uniform, her face. Tauriel twists onto her back, her heart pounding in her throat and sees a sight that makes her blood run cold.

Plunging down towards her, in all of his terrifying glory is Smaug, his mouth wide open, row upon row of huge white fangs showing. He’s falling faster than she is and in the blink of an eye, her entire world consists of the interior of Smaug’s mouth as it looms before her.

Tauriel twists instinctively in the air, and Smaug’s head goes sailing by. Without thinking about it, she whips out her dagger and stabs it into the nearest part of him she can reach - his eye.

Smaug jerks to a stop so suddenly Tauriel’s arms are nearly yanked out of their sockets but she _just_ manages to hold on to her dagger, gasping at the fact that she’s suddenly swinging by her fingertips. The dragon is howling, his powerful wings frantically beating the air as he tries to make sense of what has just happened. As someone who hasn’t been hurt in centuries, getting stabbed in the eye fills him with terror just as much as rage. His head thrashes from side to side in a vigorous attempt to shake her off and Tauriel is hanging on with all her might, as she’s whipped to and fro…

Her dagger suddenly slides out of the dragon’s eye and Tauriel is flung to the side…

Smaug is too angry to speak, a familiar orange glow creeping over his scales as he opens his mouth wide…

“Tauriel!” Killi rushes to the edge of a nearby building, holds his arms out to catch her as she flies out over the flaming city…

It’s a black blur streaking through the sky, flying straight and true into his heart…

Tauriel crashes into Killi’s arms and they both end up sprawled on the roof.

Smaug blinks…

Then looks down in disbelief at the very edge of a black arrow sticking out of his chest. At the top of the tower stands the bard, tall and proud, his dark glare fixed on the dragon, confident in the fact that he has righted his ancestors wrong, that he has changed their story forever.

Smaug looks like he can’t quite understand what’s happening as he says. “But that’s…impossible…I am death.”

“No,” the bard said steadily, his gaze fixed on the stunned dragons, “you’re dead.”

A second passes. And then there is a sound then like nothing they have ever heard – part wail, part howl, part screech and even the bard shrinks away from the noise. Even as flames erupt from the dragon’s mouth he’s falling backwards, his wings crumpling against him. A bright beacon of fire shoots into the sky as Smaug falls and the horrible sound doesn’t end until he finally crashes into the fiery grave he forged with his own breath – the product of his fury stretching up flaming arms to wrap him in its embrace... The dragon lands with a thunderous thud and then once again…there is silence…

When Tauriel doesn’t lift her head up from his chest even after long seconds have passed, fear cuts through Kili. He calls her name twice before she lifts up her head, shakes her hair out of her face. He’s worried, that its all been too much for her and maybe she’s about to break but even as he reaches up to cup her cheek, his eyes asking if she is okay, Tauriel smiles.

And then she begins to laugh.

He’s bewildered but glad that she seems fine. and when she continues to laugh, bright, tinkling laughter spilling out of her mouth like stars he can’t help but laugh too even as he asks why.

“It is hilarious the things a captain of the guard can accomplish in one day, is it not?  Wake up, save a dwarf, ride a dragon, all in a day’s work.”

He grins when she continues laughing. “You did more than that, you helped kill a dragon.”

“I did. “ Tauriel pauses, surprised, looking down at him for confirmation. When he nods, she smiles big and wide. “ I did” she says softly and then begins to laugh again. Her mirth stems mostly from tiredness, from frayed nerves and from adrenaline that translates into amusement but Kili doesn’t care. He let’s her get it out because its better than crying and because she needs to and while she laughs, Kili’s gaze on her is warm.

The sky above them is a black that fades to reddish-orange near the horizon and if he were to look out, across the city, he’d see it bathed in flames but Kili doesn’t look. He has eyes only for Tauriel. For the way her eyes sparkle when she laughs, for the way her hair falls around them like a crimson curtain blocking out the rest of the world, for how achingly beautiful she really is…

He shouldn’t, he knows he shouldn’t, but he can’t help sliding his hands into the silky mass of her hair and gently dragging her head down to capture her lips with his. Tauriel gasps in surprise, and Kili hungrily deepens the kiss.

And its bliss - to be able sink his fingers in her hair, to lose himself so completely in the taste of her, the feel of her against him; her heart thudding against his. He kisses her slowly, thoroughly, like he has all the time in the world to get to know her and yet like he has none, a mixture of desire and desperation that leaves Tauriel breathless, aching. She tangles her fingers in his shirt, melts against him as his mouth does soft, warm, devastating things to her.

And here it is, the fireworks and the fire – moonbeams, stardust, heat, passion, desire, here is everything that she thought she was looking for in Legolas. A sigh slips out of her burning throat and her pleasure spills into him like wine, rich and drugging. His body feels heavy, disconnected from everything around him that is not Tauriel. Tauriel’s hair, Tauriel’s lips, Tauriel’s pleasure sinking through him, mixing with his; he can feel it all the way down to his bones. He wants to hear her again, captures her bottom lip, and teases it between his teeth until Tauriel moans, nice and sweet and low. Kili kisses her until he can’t think, until he can’t breathe; until it feels like he’s being sucked down some velvet lined airless tunnel and he’ll never want or need light again...

Only then does he pull back, breathless.

Tauriel’s eyes stay closed for an endearing handful of seconds. When they flutter open she gives him a look of dazed wonder.

He can't help but smile at the sweetness of it. Still, as he gently nuzzles his nose against hers, he's ready with his apology. He hadn't meant to take her by surprise like that. Certainly, he hadn't meant to circumvent her right to give or withhold her consent. He’s barely manages to whisper, "i'm sorry", before Tauriel is frantically shaking her head and leaning down to capture his lips in another kiss.

It’s his turn to be stunned, amazed, dazed.

For Tauriel, there is nothing now but him, his lips, his warm hands, running up and down her back – there is no place for words here, no place for anything except holding him and being glad they’re both still alive. Being glad that he never gave up on them.

When she pulls away eventually, she rests her forehead against his, her heart thrumming in her chest, trying to catch her breath. When she realizes he’s smiling, Tauriel pulls away to look him in eyes, sees something like hope, something like fear, something like love that has her heart rising to her throat. The last little something keeping her from falling too far, too fast slips away and she realizes…quite accidentally, quite suddenly, quite unexpectedly, that yes… yes she could love him.

But she doesn’t tell him that. What she says instead, so softly that if Kili’s every sense wasn’t honed in on her he might have missed it, is, “I’m in…whatever this is between us…I’m in. Just...slowly?”

She gazes at him with a hint of worry in those lovely green eyes, as if there was ever a chance that he'd reject her, no matter how slowly she wants to take it.

Killi doesn’t have words and even if he did, they’d be useless in conveying the feelings surging up in him now so he just nods and pulls her into his arms and holds her tight. Tauriel returns his fierce embrace, burying her face in his neck and he can’t help it, the laughter that spills out of his mouth, holding the most amazing woman in the world in his arms, bathed in the glow and the warmth of fire as the entire city of Laketown burns.

 

***

 

After everything that had happened tonight, the dwarves and the people of laketown -homeless, desolate, retire to Erabor.

It was a harder job cleaning up the Lonely Mountain than it was finding a place to settle everyone. If the people had been scared of the dragon while he was asleep, actually meeting him had rattled them to their cores. Even knowing he was dead, they couldn’t bring themselves to go further into the mountain than the main throne room and so the dwarves banded together, bringing old blankets, spare clothes and more from abandoned stores within the castle; carried up brooms and dusters and together with a number of the men and women of laketown, began cleaning up the throne-room. It took quite a while but eventually, when the hall that had once seated kings was again free of giant cobwebs, decay and dust, the dwarves assembled to look around the home that had been ripped from them and there were smiles and hugs and tears in eyes and despite everything, a few of the people found space in their hearts to smile as well. Fires were lit, and positions were taken and even though they had lost virtually everything the people of Laketown came together as people tend to do - passing around pieces of bread, cheese and anything else they had managed to salvage. It was only after everyone was reasonable comfortable, that Killi could slip away to find Tauriel.

She was sitting on a wooden bench on the balcony, an overhang carved into the side of the mountain that allowed a wide view of the valley beneath. The window was also a door, glass edged in gold and through it, he could see her staring up at the sky.

There were still no stars.

Everything that had happened this night and everything that threatened to happen had just begun to sink in and exhaustion seeped into her slowly like tea leaves in hot water: Killi and kisses, Legolas and Orcs, Dragons…

Thranduil and kingdoms, and duties and futures -

Killi approaches her carefully and Tauriel is so deep in thought that she doesn't realize he’s right beside her until he unfurls the blanket in his arms and wraps it around her. She looks up at him, surprised. Her eyes soften as he tucks it under her chin and sinks down beside her, smiling. “Hi” he says.

She can’t remember the last time in the past six hundred years anyone has cared for her in even this most simple of ways. Her mother used to, a long, long time ago but even that is a dim memory, already faded like a beloved photograph worn out with too many viewings. Vaguely she can remember her eyes, the gentleness of her touch, the warmth of her hug. Disjointed bits and pieces that still manage to feel like home, even if it is a long lost one.

She pulls the blanket tighter around her and suddenly has to fight off the urge to cry. She blames her heightened emotions on her exhaustion, and the fact that its been possibly the longest day of her six hundred years. Her eyes feel like they’ve been scrubbed with sandpaper and her head is filled with a dull steady throbbing that started the moment she began thinking about Thranduil but she can’t quite bring herself to close her eyes because this was the kind of day where the instant she did she’d find Orcs on the horizon. So she blinks the wetness from her eyes and returns his “hey” Killi catches the huskiness in her voice and quietly takes her hand, rubbing soothing circles into the back of it. He’s left a little bit of space between them, out of courtesy, or caution, not knowing exactly how she’s feeling after everything that’s happened, she’s sure, but Tauriel slides closer to him, until his arm is pressed against hers and he can’t help smiling at that.

The night sky is rich and dark above her, the moon huge and bright. There are no stars but the air is crisp and clean; bliss after the smoke, ash and choking burning of Laketown. It’s the closest she’s felt to the woodland realms since she left. She’ll have to warn everyone about the orcs soon before they actually show up on the horizon…but she can’t quite bring herself to do it just yet. Too much has happened and is still happening and she just…really, really needs everything to pause for a second, to bask in the peace of this night.

They haven’t said a word to each other. They don’t need to. Somehow, Tauriel is completely certain that Kili understands a large part of how she feels without having asked her and Kili is maintaining the silence of her sanctuary. The rushing warmth she feels towards him now is beyond words, demands action but all she does is reach down to squeeze his hand, tangle their fingers together. Kili grins at her and gives her hand a gentle squeeze back.

Its only a matter of time before he fakes a yawn, stretches his arms up into the sky and then around the back of the seat. Tauriel has to actively suppress the grin that’s threatening to break out. "smooth" she wants to say.

Instead, she shifts even closer and leans into him, tucking her head into the curve of his neck. She smiles at the rapid thudding of his heart and when Killi wraps one arm around her, she takes the other and begins a gentle exploration of it. She soon decides that she loves his hands; loves the way she can tickle him just by running her fingers lightly along the small, dark curls at the back, loves that even though he's almost three heads shorter than her, his hand somehow manages to be twice as big, easily enveloping hers when the need arises. She loves the way they’re so warm, loves the slight calluses that have developed from all the time he spends practicing with his bow.

Tauriel smiles as he whispers in her ear, teasing gently, “You like my hands”.

Saying it makes him happy, just because he _could_ say that kind of thing to her now. He isn't expecting the way she draws back, the way her eyes soften, melt, the way he’s managed to touch her heart and Tauriel reaches a hand up to his face, gently stroking the fuzz that lines his chin. “yes, I do,” she whispers, her expression impossibly tender. A kiss as soft rose petals on his lips, and another, and one more before she rests her forehead against his, her eyes closing at his warmth, at the feel of his skin against hers. “I like everything about you.”

His heart thuds unsteadily at the words, at the simple sincerity in them, at the warmth of her skin on his, her palm still against his cheek.

“Come to bed” he murmurs softly and Tauriel draws back surprised.

Killi chuckles and flushes. “No, not like that.”

“How did you mean it then?” she asks, thoroughly amused, an eyebrow arching just to tease him a little bit.

She's expecting him to make one of his jokes, to say something scandalous or steal a kiss which is why when all Kili does is bring her back into his embrace, pulling her into the warm circle of both arms this time, so that her head rests easily on his shoulder, she’s caught off guard. He kisses first her left eye, and then her right and Tauriel’s eyes drift closed as she sinks bonelessly against him, glad when Kili pulls her even closer.

He runs gentle fingers just under her eyes where she knows shadows have collected. “You’re exhausted.” He says gently, “but you won’t rest. You haven’t taken off your boots, or uniform,” Tauriel pulls away to give him a mock scandalized look at that and Kili groans and pulls her back in so that he can bury his face in her hair while she laughs. “You know what I mean!”

She did, but it was so much more fun teasing him. Still, she sobers up when Kili murmurs “what’s wrong?” into her hair. His hands are rubbing up and down the length of her arm under the blanket and Tauriel finds herself, sighing and shifting closer as Kili presses a kiss to her hair. He rests his check on her head and waits.

She doesn’t want to talk about the more emotionally draining circumstances that are occupying her thoughts, all she wants to do is stay here and let him hold her for however long the chaos that is often their lives will allow but he’s been so sweet and wonderful in such a short period of time that she can’t see how she can’t not tell him at least a little bit of what has been bothering her. So she talks about the Orcs.

And when he draws back to look at her with wide eyes she can’t help but sigh internally at the loss of his warmth even though she’d expected that hearing about an Orc army, equipped to the teeth and from the bowls of Mordor heading your way after experiencing the desolation of Smaug was bound have that kind of effect. But then Kili gets a decisive look on his face.

“Tomorrow” he says and when she merely looks confused he tells her “we’ll worry about it tomorrow.”

“Killi – ” she starts to protest but he steals her words with a kiss; just the brief, warm press of his mouth against hers but when he pulls away, she's too distracted by the butterfly wings suddenly fluttering in her stomach to immediately finish her sentence.

“Tomorrow,” he murmurs, his face still enticingly close, “we’ll deal with all of it tomorrow.”

Tauriel takes in his steady gaze, the tenderness, the strength, the care, considers the exhaustion eating its way into her bones and then nods slowly. “tomorrow.” She agrees.

“good.” He smiles and she has to return it. When Kili stays close, his eyes darkening, Tauriel’s smile only lengthens. “you know if you kiss me – ”

“mmm?” Kili murmurs, thoroughly distracted.

“neither of us will be getting much sleep tonight?” she murmurs.

He pauses, a grin forming and wants to ask her if that was a promise. Instead he stretches up and dusts kisses along her eyes, her nose, her cheeks while she laughs and then a soft, brief kiss on her mouth before he stands and offers her his hand. When she takes it, he helps her to her feet and leads her inside.

 

***

The  beds haven't been used in decades so of course they  have to strip off the bedsheets. Kili hunts for another blanket and spreads it over the mattress as a covering before climbing on.

  
He opens his arms in invitation and Tauriel hesitates for only a second before climbing on the bed and cuddling up to him, her head resting on his chest, his arms tightening around her. Killi is warm - blissfully warm, wonderfully warm - and she feels so secure that she doesn't care that they both smelled like smoke. It is quiet then, except for the sound of their breaths, Kili’s heartbeat a lullaby in her ears and moonlight spilling in through the window, the moon huge and round in the sky.  
  
She asks him to tell her a story because her mind wouldn’t let her rest, despite her heavy eyes. He thinks for a bit and tells her an epic tale about how an elf met a dwarf in Mirkwood forest and saved his life only to lock him up within the cells of the woodland realm after cruelly refusing to search him – Tauriel smiles into his chest. He tells her of a lover of starlight, destroyer of orcs, rider of dragons, capturer of his heart but before he can get to the best part, the part about how the dwarf she’d rescued realized he was deeply, hopelessly in love with her –Tauriel has fallen asleep.

Killi glances down at her sleeping form and smiles a tender smile. He’d tell her another time. He lets himself enjoy the experience of holding her just a little bit more, Tauriel warm and soft in his arms. Then he hooks his arms underneath her and lifts her gently to the other side of the bed so that he can get up. Short he may be, but weak he most certainly is not. He has to warn Thorin and the others about the Orcs so that they can start making preparations for the upcoming attack. In the meantime, he wants Tauriel to get some sleep. It's been a long day.

He spreads the blanket he'd given her over her once again and tucks it under her chin. Pressing a kiss to her forehead, he whispers his ‘I love you’ into her hair. Just because it made him happy, just because he could.

He's leaving when he notices it, the huge star right in the middle of where nothing used to be. He turns back to Tauriel, fast asleep and grins, thinking that she’d have loved to see it; that if starlight was memory, precious and pure then there’s no memory more so than her, here, with him. And whether she knows it or not, she is his star and his dream and his heart.

When he closes the door, it is with a gentle click and he takes a moment to lean his head against it. Basking in pure, smiling bliss, he closes his eyes and thinks – of Tauriel and new beginnings. Of battlefields and possibilities. of passion and promises and how three little words had the power to change everything and smiles even wider.

I love you…

He’d tell her in the morning.


	5. Holding On

Tauriel looks all around at the death, destruction and despair surrounding the people of Lake-town and feels her heart grow unbearably heavy. Where once a town had stood, a messy jumble of charred wood and scattered debris lay instead, bunt logs sticking out of the water like broken limbs, shattered possessions littering the ground and all around her a chorus of dismayed wails sounding. Even with their warning and their attempt to clear the town, there were casualties (There were always casualties.) and the sudden rush towards the bodies in the water has something inside her fracturing slowly. Weeping mothers drag lifeless children out of the lake, wives drape themselves over husbands that had long since grown cold, hollow-eyed children huddle here and there, unclaimed and all around activity and cries and shouts as the people of Dale tried to salvage _something_ out of the ruins that had once been their home.

“Tauriel!”

She turns at the sound of Kili’s voice and when her eyes find him hurrying to her through the throng of people she feels a rushing mix of pleasure, joy and trepidation all at once.

Today is a new day after all.

Yesterday, she had defied her king’s orders and left their lands without permission, letting the prince come along without a second thought.

Yesterday, Kili had kissed her on a rooftop surrounded by a city engulfed in flames and lit a different kind of fire in her heart.

Yesterday, he’d sat with her, talked with her, wrapped her in a blanket and soothed her fears of tomorrow, promising that they would face whatever came together.

Yesterday, he’d held her and lulled her with a story while she fell asleep in his arms.

Yesterday had been magical, almost like a dream but today was a completely new day. Today, she would face the consequences of all the actions she had taken yesterday and from the moment she’d woken up in the dwarves' home, she’d felt the crushing weight of the inevitability of reality; of the price she would have to pay for the handful of moments she had stolen.  Now, surrounded by charred wood, bloated bodies and despair, reality was once more rushing in like a sweeping tide, carrying her hopes of holding onto yesterday’s dream with it.

For a second they both don’t know what to say and settle with simply drinking in the sight of the other. He’s sure she can see it: the longing, the relief, that’s coursing through him. It looks like she might smile but there’s a caution in her eyes that wasn’t there yesterday and he too knows that the dream is coming to an end; reality is trying to force its way in. Thankfully, he’s far more stubborn than even the real world can be and he’s not letting her go without a fight.

 “I thought you’d left without saying goodbye.” He says finally, by way of explanation.

She shakes her head no, but then gives him a small, rueful smile, “but maybe I should have. It might have been easier.”

They both know that their being together was never about things being easy.

A brand new day has arrived and they should have their entire future unrolling before them; instead it seems to be coming apart at the seams.

He reaches for her hand, intertwines their fingers. He’s never been very eloquent, not like Thorin or Balin. He’s young and sometimes foolish and impulsive and yes, his mother was right to worry because he can be reckless. So he doesn’t quite trust his words but tries to tell her anyway (without them ) that there’s still a chance; that what they have is worth holding onto. And he’s sure, as his thumb massages slow circles into the back of her hand, as tears slowly fill her eyes he’s sure she understands him.

He’s going to wrap her in his arms, not giving a damn about who sees them but before he can, something over his shoulder catches her attention. He sees Fili and Bofur land on the shore and he realizes time is running out. He’d asked them to cover for him and now he needs to get back before the new, darker, _changed_ Thorin realizes he’s gone.

He turns back to her urgently, finally knowing exactly what he wants to say but before he can she tells him, “They are your people. You must go.” She detaches from him, and moves away. And for a second he stands, despair filling him. But he hadn’t come all this way just to give up so he whirls around and follows her.

“Come with me.” He says, half urging, half pleading and at that she turns to face him, surprised.

“I know what I feel” he continues passionately, “and I’m not afraid. You make me feel alive.” He doesn’t realize until he’s said it just much he means it. And maybe it’s his youth and foolish recklessness that are making him want to smile but he knows he’s not being reckless about this. Fearless maybe, but not reckless.

Still, she turns away, pained, her voice cracking on her denial, “I can’t.”

“Tauriel,” he says, gently turning her back to him, “ _Abrâlimê_ ”

He says it in his own tongue, because the sentiment comes straight from his heart. He knows she shouldn’t know what it means but the look on her face now tells him that maybe... yes she does....

Still she hedges, shifts away and whispers “I don’t know what that means,” suddenly wary.

He smiles, amused, happy. He could explain but, “oh, I think you do.” He returns.

It takes her a second but then she moves closer, her eyes softening and it feels like maybe she’s about to return the sentiment when she suddenly tenses, straightens.

She says something he’d guess would be “My Lord Legolas,” in elvish and he turns his attention to glare at the blond elf that’s always hovering somewhere around her.

He says something coldly to Tauriel in their tongue. Then softens his voice ever so slightly.

Still, from the stricken look she gives him, it’s clear that she has to go.

So he guesses that’s it then. He gives a short jerky nod to show he understands, the disappointment welling up in him bitter on his tongue. He turns but only goes a few steps before coming to a halt. He knows she bears the heavier burden where their relationship is concerned. There’s far more that she’ll have to lose or give up, so he doesn’t want to pressure her into a decision that she’ll end up regretting later but he does need her to know that he’s here, and that whenever she’s ready, he’s willing to fight for them. He won’t, _can’t_ just give up.

With that in mind he whirls around and strides determinedly towards her. He reaches for her hand and her breath catches as he places his runestone inside it. He closes her fingers over his gift and cups her delicate hand in both of his, holds their hands against his heart. “Keep it” he tells her, “as a promise.”

And despite everything he’s got her smiling at least; knows that she’s touched. This time he really does leave and doesn’t look back until he’s on the boat with his brother and Bofur. When he does, he sees Tauriel clutching his promise to _her_ heart, desperately trying to blink back tears.

***

Legolas doesn’t ask about what Kili gave her and Tauriel doesn’t tell him. Instead after hearing of her banishment, they make their way quickly and silently to Gundabad, his words hanging over both their heads. Whatever Legolas might have felt for her, she’d never have guessed that it was enough to renounce his kingdom over but had he done it as one of her oldest friends, as someone who was like an older brother to her or as a man who still held hope that there was a possibility she would give herself to him as a woman?

When they actually got to Gundabad, her worries were temporarily driven from her mind. As Legolas surveyed the desolate landscape he announced that they would wait for the cover of nightfall. “It is a foul place Tauriel,” he explained, “in another age our people waged war on those lands...” he trailed off, attention sliding away. She turned her head towards him, wondering at the vacant expression that had stolen over his features.

He paused, as if deciding whether to tell her something and then revealed simply, “my mother died there.”

What? She turned more towards him, a slight frown on her face, her eyes concerned. She hadn’t known that.

“Father does not speak of it.” He continued, his eyes taking on a haunted quality, “there is no grave. No memory...nothing.” he turns back to look at Gundabad and she knows he’s not inviting pity but she can’t help lightly covering one of his hands with hers. She too knew what it felt like to lose a parent, two actually and already, her memories were fading away, almost as if they had never been. It felt traitorous to forget, is agony to remember what you have lost forever but even greater agony to have no choice in the matter, unable to choose memories you keep or leave so she knows full well his anguish. Though it hurts, she keeps reaching for shards of her past despite the cuts they leave on her soul. Though he might wish for them, Legolas doesn’t even have shards to reach for. He doesn’t say anything, but turns his hand to gently squeeze her fingers.

There is a moment of silence then as they are both lost to their thoughts and then Tauriel figures it’s now or never.

“Legolas – ” she begins,

“what, no Lord legolas now?” he asks quietly, an eyebrow rising.

He’s right, she’s crossed too many boundaries with him these past few days, “lord Legolas”

He chuckles softly, “That was only my poor attempt at humour Tauriel, relax.”

She’s torn between being amused and wanting to box him on the ears. “Legolas – ”

“Don’t worry,” he murmurs before she can finish, “this is not some last minute seduction, to steal you away from your dwarf with my staggering woes.” He smirks briefly at her while Tauriel’s mouth falls open.

“I...I've never told anyone about my mother...i just wanted you to know.”

She’s touched, and from the smile he gives her, guileless, warm, he knows it as well.

“If you’re open to last minute seductions though-”

“Legolas!” she chastises. He chuckles, eyes twinkling. It’s been a long time since he’s smiled at her she realizes with some surprise and she can’t help feeling relieved even as she returns his smile. She’s not naive enough to believe what he’s grown to feel for her can be erased in the blink of an eye but she knows that he’ll try to move on and so here, at least, things are almost normal.

By nightfall she’s itching to burn out the stresses and tensions of the past few days. “if we’re going in, we should go in now.” She tells him.

But almost before she’s finished speaking a stream of bats comes screeching over them and begin swarming.

“These bats are bred for one purpose and one purpose only,” observes Legolas grimly.

“What?” she asks.

“war.”

Sure enough when Bolg gives the order, out marches row after row after row of the Orc legion while Tauriel stares in shock. “we have to warn the others.”

He nods, getting up. “We may already be too late. Hurry.”

 

***

 

In a sense, they _were_ too late.

Bodies are scattered all around: dwarves, elves, humans, Orcs, it doesn’t matter; Death has found them all. But, nothing she sees fills her with as much fury as the image of her king fleeing. Later she knows that this may be the craziest thing she has ever done, her recklessness surpassing Kili proportions but for now she doesn’t care. If he leaves, if he does what he always does and runs, then those who died to fight, to _help_ will have died for nothing. _Then_ all the lives lost around her would truly have been wasted, mortal and immortal alike. And for _what_? So that the Orcs could win, only to have them fight a new war at their home, to count more dead in addition to all those they could have saved today? No.

“Ahio au la!” she tells her King as he approaches with a retreating company of elves behind him, “You will _not_ turn away.” She doesn’t know which makes her quiver more, her anguish, or her anger. “Not this time.”

Surprise covers his face first, then, if she didn’t know better the briefest flicker of what could have been pain before the rage arrives. “Get out of my way!”

“The dwarves will be slaughtered,” she accused.

“Yes,” he said contemptuously, lip curling up, “they _will_ die. Today, tomorrow, one year hence, a hundred years from now -What does it matter? They are _mortal_.” He practically sneers the word.

And maybe it’s that that pushes her over the edge. Or maybe it’s that she has spent the majority of her life, serving, trusting, believing in a King that found it more desirable to let an entire world perish if he could remain safe hiding behind his tall walls; a king that saw no value in the life of any but his own people. A king so short-sighted that he would kill them all.  

Maybe its knowing that part of the reason Kili, Fili and Thorin were up at Ravenhill alone is because they had chosen to take a stand against the growing evil threatening them all, unlike him. The mortals he sneered at risked their lives for them all, putting aside petty differences to face their true enemy while the immortal 'king' cowered. She’d been wound up tight as a bowstring from the beginning of this day, only growing tighter and tighter as the day progressed: her meeting with the people of laketown and their dismay, having to watch kili walk away, her banishment, rushing all the way back to warn them of the Orcs only to realize that they’d already fallen into the trap, the bodies she’ stepped over on her way here - this was simply the last straw and Tauriel snapped, whipping out her bow and aiming it at his chest whilst the elves behind him let out hushed gasps.

“You think your life is worth more than theirs when there is no love in it?” she asked Thranduil, who also seemed to be quivering with outrage, “when there is _no_. _Love_. _In_. _you_ ” she hissed.

He looked away for a second and Tauriel almost believed that it was her words that had affected him.  Then in a movement too quick for even her heightened senses to process, Thranduil sliced through her bow with a vicious cut leaving a shocked Tauriel holding onto two pieces of useless wood that dropped from frozen fingers.

 In that instant, the look on his face was terrifying; nothing less than pure bitter _fury_ staring down at her.

“What do you know about love? _Nothing!_ ” He hissed, the cold point of his sword pressing against her chest hard enough to pierce through her uniform, to draw a tear of blood over her heart.  “What you feel for that dwarf is not real.”

Tauriel let out a quiet gasp. He knew? He knew. And his words washed over her with a frigidity intense enough to send goose-bumps rising up on her arms.

Suddenly, quite suddenly she was terrified. He could kill her, right now. He _would_ kill her, right now.

And worse yet...maybe he was right. That was what scared her most of all. She knew nothing about love. She was sure that once upon a time, she had loved her parents but they had died before the understanding of what it truly meant to choose to love someone and be loved in return could solidify. Then she had loved her King as her savior, a banner against the orcs and all the evil filth that walked the earth; a shining light that cut effortlessly through the darkness and hated it as much as she did; She loved him as the only father figure she had ever really known but that was a love that was only occasionally returned and then, only in the briefest moments of escaped affection. She had loved him before she understood the coldness in him; that he could watch an entire village, army, _race_ of people die without blinking and rationalize it by saying that they were mortal; that they were going to die anyway without taking any notice of the love, the hope, the beauty that could have existed in their remaining days.

No, she didn’t know anything about love and that was why everything she felt for Kili, confused her, amazed her, enchanted her and terrified her. What if he was right? And it didn’t last? What if she woke up ten years from now, twenty, thirty, forty and realized that she been enraptured, charmed,  infatuated – but not in love only to find she’d already given up all that she held dear to hold onto what was essentially less than a dream...an illusion, vapor, mist, smoke.

“You think it is love?” Thranduil pressed, when she couldn’t respond. “Are you willing to die for it?”

Whether he was taunting her or testing her Tauriel couldn’t be sure, but she did know that for all the uncertainties concerning how she truly felt about Kili... he was worth fighting for. The dwarfs, though of a different race, were worth fighting for and so were the people of Laketown. so was everyone that was risking their lives to stand against the growing evil in their lands.

In response to his question, she slid her two daggers out of their holders and twirled them lightly in her hands though she made no move to knock away Thranduil's blade. His eyes narrowed into icy slits. Her message was clear.

_Yes. Yes I am._

In the second after her gesture, Tauriel stared down her king, no longer afraid, no longer shaking, the tears in her eyes drying. Whatever he saw was enough to make him hesitate for a moment, and in that second, a sword came out with a metallic rasp and pushed away Thranduil’s from her heart. She couldn’t help the quiet sigh of relief she breathed.

Thranduil turned, surprise and outrage forming only to be replaced by confusion when he saw his son, Legolas.

“ _Ci hen nae-tha-thog, oru denithon_ (If you harm her, you will have to kill me)” Legolas announced grimly, glaring at his father.

Thranduil looked as though he had been punched in the gut, his face contorting silently in pain. That his son would pull a sword, not to support but to subvert him was unprecedented. Perhaps the only one that her King was still capable of loving after the death of his beloved wife was his beloved son. Thranduil looked so wounded that Tauriel couldn’t help feeling a flicker of empathy.

Then Legolas was at her side in solidarity, telling her, “I will go with you.”

And there was no more time to feel sorry for anyone. She turned immediately and hurried towards Ravenhill – sending a silent prayer to the gods that they wouldn't be too late.

 

*****

Kili inched along the passage, his eyes scouring ahead. The walls, damp, frigid and dark seemed to press in on all sides and every step he took carried with it the threat of an Orc, or worse, an army of Orcs just waiting to catch him unawares. It was not until he reached the end of the tunnel where its oval entrance allowed bright light to diffuse inside that he could breathe a sigh of relief, sagging momentarily against the cold stone walls.

Suddenly, he heard the rasping of an Orc tongue above him and he froze, pressing his back against the wall of the tunnel. He tightened his grip on his sword, and slowly leaned out, angling his head up to make out the enemy.

At first, watching the dancing, wriggling mass above him, Kili felt only confusion. That looked nothing like any Orc he had ever met and even more surprising, if it was an Orc, it appeared that it was having some sort of fit while trying to walk on air.

He tilted his head to get a better look and what he saw made his blood run cold.

Fili was held fast in the grip of none other than Azog the destroyer, caught up helplessly by his hair, and struggling desperately. The orc said something in its tongue, whether directed at no one or towards the others, Kili didn’t know or care. His mind was consumed by the image of Azog lifting up that jagged, terrible blade –

Without waiting to see where he would aim it, kili dashed out. His heart pounded in his ears, deafeningly loud but he could _feel_ the pause in the air,

 _feel_ the blade poised behind Fili,

 _feel,_ Azog’s malicious satisfaction.

He dove to the ground and as he fumbled in the snow for a stone, He heard Fili yell “Run!”

His hand suddenly closes around something jagged, cold, hard and about as big as his palm. He doesn’t think. Just aims at Azog and flings it as hard as he can.

He sees Azog steady his blade over his brother’s heart.

He sees his stone flying through the air.

He sees it connecting with the Orcs head, just as his blade makes the thrust.

He hears the Orcs grunt, and yet, still, the sickening sound of steel sinking into flesh.

Azog searches for him, finds him, and his eyes narrow, blazing first with fury and then smug satisfaction. The sound he hears then is bestial; a tortured cry he would not have believed could come from anyone, let alone himself.

With a casual gesture, his brother is flung into the air, tossed carelessly like garbage, and Kili watches numbly as Fili’s body tumbles down, down –

He doesn’t even know he’s moving until his brother’s body crashes into him, knocking him down into the snow. He’s feeling a thousand different things at once but all he can think about is gently rolling his brother over, to see for himself that his brother is dead...

Except he’s not.

Fili stares up at him with eyes that are wide with shock and fear, and as if from an invisible fountain somewhere deep within, blood wells up and flows from his mouth. But he is alive. Fili’s hand grasps for his brother’s arm and Kili can see his panic and terror building. He doesn’t hesitate to clasp his brother’s raised hand and squeeze as hard as he can. His vision blurs but he angrily banishes his tears and searches his brother’s body. The stone made all the difference. Instead of plunging his blade through his brother’s heart as he had intended, the distraction had shifted Azog’s blade and inch or two to the left. But judging from the look of things, from the watery wheezing his breath made in the back of his throat, it had managed to at least nick one of his lungs. And his brother was rapidly losing blood, each second, causing more of Fili’s life to escape; crimson seeping through the snow...

The pain of releasing his brother’s hand he felt like a physical blow, the fact that he couldn’t wipe away Fili’s tears or spare a moment to reassure him, another and as Kili worked to save his brother’s life, he counted the blows and marked the ways in which he would repay them back to Azog and all the orcs.

He wasn’t a healer but in this moment he remembered at least part of his battle training. Cold constricted the blood vessels, slowed the flow of blood and gave the wound a chance to clot far more easily if it was bound. Exposing his brother’s wound on both sides, Kili first packed snow over Fili’s wound and then wrapped him in a blanket of snow. He stopped only twice, the first time when he heard the sound of rapidly approaching footsteps and turned without pausing,  a snarl already on his face. When he realized it was Bilbo, Dwalin and Thorin that were approaching, he focused on his brother once more. He just had to get this done. If he could get this done before Fili bled out, he would live. His brother _would_ live.

The second was when Fili’s breathing turned from a wheeze into a watery gargle. Dwalin, Bilbo and Thorin both helped him gently turn his brother on his side, so that the blood seeped out of his mouth and onto the snow. Bilbo had made a makeshift bandage from his sleeves and After Kili wrapped up his brother’s wound, he finished covering him in a blanket of ice.

Only then did Kili allow the tears that had been building to fall, taking in a ragged breath as the fear he had refused to acknowledge ripped through him.

Thorin gave him a few seconds and then squeezed his shoulder gently, “kili,” Throrin said, from his left side, “this will not be enough. If he does not die from his wounds, he will die from the cold. We have to get him out of here.”

Kili clenched his teeth against the remaining sobs, realizing only just now that he was trembling. “I know.” He eventually managed to say. “Wait five minutes, and then get him out.” He said to both Dwalin and Bilbo. Wiping away the rest of his tears with the back of his hand, he looked Bilbo right in the eye. “Can I trust you?” he asked.

There was a moment where it seemed the entire world pivoted on the hobbits answer. Then he gave a short, determined nod. “Of course you can Kili. I won’t let him die.”

“Bilbo!” Thorin said sharply, gaining all their attention, “don’t make promises you can’t keep.” he finished, his tone softening.

They all turned to look at Fili. He was shivering weakly in his cocoon of snow, teeth rattling, skin unnaturally pale, frozen tears stuck to his cheek.

For another second it hung in the air, the very real possibility that Fili wouldn’t survive. Then Bilbo turned to Kili and rephrased his words. “I’ll get him out, to Gandalf, I’ll get some help.” And he said it with such steely determination in his eyes, it was almost impossible to doubt him.

Instead, Kili clasped the hobbits hand in gratitude, his gaze sliding to Dwalin who also gave him a determined nod. 

He moved towards Fili and pressed a kiss to his cheek, then lay his forehead against his brother's cold skin. 

"Hold on" he whispered to him.

Then almost at the same time, he and Thorin stood up and quite suddenly, the full force of Kili’s raw rage broke over him with such intensity, he could have howled with it.  Without saying a word, he knew he and Thorin were in agreement.

Find Azog.

And Kill him.

***

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guuuys!! I know its been a looong time since i updated this story and to those of you who were waiting for another chapter, i'm sorry. So much happened during this time, i could literally list a thousand things : exams, college apps, my grandma's funeral, my laptop getting destroyed etc. etc. etc. but, none of those things is as important as the simple facts that 1) i am back and 2) i will most definitely be finishing this story come hell or high water; you can bet on it. There's too much potential with these two to not see things through.  
> If you've watched the movie The battle of five armies, you'll notice that the story follows a similar sequence of events but with my own twist to things. Frankly, i felt like the ending for these two lacked substance; i simply can't accept the way things turned out... so i won't.  
> To all those who read this and who will be continuing with this story, thank you very much; i appreciate the interest and support and...let the games begin :)


	6. Turning Point

Later on, she tries to remember how it had all gone so wrong...

***

Upon reaching Ravenhill, she’d hastened upwards, dispatching all the Orcs she could find, her mind focused on one thing only – Kili. She had to make sure he was alright. And also, she had something she desperately needed to tell him.

She finally came to a small overhang that overlooked the rest of the icy mountains and beyond that, a sheer drop to deadly rocky surfaces beneath. Not knowing what else to do she spun around, searching the broken ruins and began yelling his name. “Kili!”

Nothing.

Despair.

“Kili!”

“Tauriel!” she heard his voice at last.

“Kili” she murmured, relieved, whirling in the direction of his voice. The icy winds and falling snow hindered her view. She couldn’t see anything but just knowing he was still alive filled her with hope and a new urgency. However, before she could head up the stairs towards the sound of his voice, the ground under her feet began to tremble.

She glanced between the rocky opening in front of her and the stairs to the side that would lead to Kili, torn, but the Orcs were too close and in the end the choice was taken away from her. As the first hideous beast showed in the shadowy tunnel just ahead, Tauriel took a few steps back and slid into a fighting position.  Another Orc, showed just behind him, and another, and another, as far back as her eyes could see. She had just a second to feel nervous, just a second to indulge a flicker of fear and then the first Orc was upon her and there was no time to feel anything but adrenaline. She slashed him down as quickly as she could while the others streamed out from the opening and surged around her.

They came at her one after the other after the other until she was a blur of fair white skin, fiery red hair and deadly instinct. An Orc lunged towards her, holding a wicked looking mace and Tauriel sidestepped him, sticking out a leg so that he went sprawling, crashing into several others. Another sliced downwards at her back and she jerked forward just in the nick of time and then whirled around and plunged a dagger into his chest. Without waiting for another attack she flung her second dagger in the eye of an Orc behind her and, pushing the first Orc off her blade, she grabbed at the dagger in the Orcs eye and sliced across his neck.

The Orc crumples to the ground and Tauriel is moving again. She doesn’t know how long she fights like this before he comes, but she’s warmed into her movements, her steps fluid, light, economical; not a single one wasted - as graceful as they would be at one of Thranduil’s lavish balls, except her dance is a dance of death. She keeps as close to the center as she can but still weaves in and out between her foes, occasionally using the overhang to her advantage. It was inevitable, she thinks later, the blow that came out of nowhere and sent her reeling; six Orcs against one, tiring elf and a number more around, more still coming out of the opening – it was inevitable.

She goes crashing to the ground and slides, not stopping until she slams into the rock wall to the side of the small overhang. Her head cracks against it. Stars explode before her eyes and she sucks in a sharp breath as her vision dims. She knows one of them is coming towards her, can feel the steady thud of his steps as he approaches, and then his shadow over her. Her hand is searching blindly for one of the two daggers she’s dropped. Just as her fingers enclose around it, and the Orc raises his mace high, she hears the sound of running, and then from nowhere, Kili.

He’d ran and jumped and landed seated on the Orcs shoulders, his sword plunging downwards into its head. Tauriel is trying to shake the stars from her vision, but has the presence of mind to slide out of the way as the Orc crashes to the ground.

Then Kili’s worried face fills her vision, “Are you alright?” he asks. She wants to tell him that she‘s better than alright now that he’s here but they’re in the middle of a fight, and her head is throbbing so instead she nods, and he helps her back to her feet.

At least half a dozen Orcs have blocked the rocky entrance from which they appeared and half a dozen more are crowded behind cutting them off the stairs, they’re surrounded and judging by the malicious grins showing all around, that was the plan all along.

There’s a moment of silence, where each side seems to be waiting for the other to move. Kili’s hand inches towards hers, and when he gently squeezes her little finger she doesn’t turn, but glancing downward from the corner of her eye, she can see her remaining dagger just by his foot.

A second...

two...

and then, as if on Cue, the Orcs break toward them and Kili flips up her dagger with his foot. she catches it effortlessly, and they attack together.

They end up, back to back, weapons locked with the enemy and she can’t help but wonder at it, how easy it is to fight with him. It’s almost as if he is an extension of her, his thoughts an extension of hers; She covers his injured knee and he covers her inadequate weaponry and she marvels at it, how easy even this is with him. That they could be so different and yet fit together so seamlessly; that he’s never seen her dance but knows all the steps anyway.

She thinks they could have gone on like that forever. When the last Orc finally falls – pushed off the edge of the overhang into empty air with a loud wail by Kili’s boot to his chest – she’s almost surprised. The battle is over and... they’ve survived?

Relief and elation wash over her and she is suddenly aware of her exhaustion. Every muscle in her body seems to ache, including her heart, and if he wasn’t turning to face her, she might consider dropping to her knees and falling asleep in the snow.

Instead they stare at each other. Kili looks just like she feels, tired, relieved...happy, and she doesn’t know who moves first except suddenly she’s holding him as tightly as she can and he’s wrapped his arm around her waist, his face buried just underneath her chest.

They stay like that for a long time. And then Kili gently releases her and when they catch each other’s eyes again, they both begin laughing. They keep meeting and surviving the most absurd life and death situations.

They laugh until Kili catches sight of her arm. “you’re hurt.” He says concerned, moving in for a closer look. There’s an ugly gash across her upper arm. She registers it with surprise. She hadn’t felt it till he said it but now he mentions it, there are a thousand other cuts and bruises that she’s just beginning to feel but none of those things matter, and she smiles as his worried eyes meet hers.

“It’s nothing, just a scratch.” He raises an eyebrow at her but looks more amused and less worried. “Besides, I think they’re a lot worse off.” She nods towards the bodies littering the ground and Kili grins, looking around.

“You’re amazing you know.” He says softly, catching her by surprise. Her heart thuds unsteadily in response to the soft brown orbs that gaze at her now. “I could see you fighting, from above. They were so many, I almost thought I wouldn’t get to you in time but you barely needed me at all. And if you hadn’t been here, I would have been surrounded. I think this is the third time you’ve saved me.”

“you’re counting?” she asked, warm from his words, his eyes.

“Definitely; I’m going to have to find some way to repay you after all his is over.” He grins at her  and she has to say it now, needs to, needs him to know – she’s only just figured it out for herself but –

“Kili, I – ”

“I love you you know,” he says softly, rendering her speechless, her heart suddenly missing several beats.

“Just in case you missed it before, I wanted to say it again, clearly. I love you.” She wasn’t expecting the tears that welled up in her eyes or the lump that lodged itself in her throat. She found herself reaching for him again, holding him close. He chuckles softly in the hollow of her neck and that somehow makes her want to smile and cry more. She wants to – has to tell him,

“I lov – ”

That’s as far as she gets. She senses the enemy before she ever sees him and in the blink of an eye, she pushes Kili to the side. She turns just in time to see Bolg running towards her. She can’t dodge his kick but tries to turn away from it and the Orc’s foot smashes into her lower back and drives her into the rock wall.

She cries out at the pain but has the presence of mind to drive her head back, smashing the back of her head into his face. The Orc stumbles back with a grunt, and Tauriel slashes at his midriff, ignoring the throbbing that’s intensified in her skull. Her daggers skate off his armour and create only shallow cuts against his thick skin. She tries to shift her aim to his neck but Bolg catches her arm, and yanks one of her daggers away, sending it spinning away from her on the ice. Tauriel wrenches her arm from his grip and renews her attack.

He swings a fist around, trying to catch her about the head but she spins under it. He sends another punch her way. She blocks it with one hand and tries to stab him with the other but again he catches her arm and this time, twists her wrist, and brings his fist slamming into her shoulder. Tauriel crumples under the force of the blow.

Her entire body is radiating pain and Bolg has a sickening smile on his face. He reaches down to grab her by the throat and lifts her feet clear off the ground. His hand is crushing her windpipe and she struggles futilely to break his hold. Seemingly enjoying her struggles, he licks his teeth slowly and Tauriel feels a flash of white hot fury. She wants to wipe the stupid smirk off his face but before she can gather the strength to try Kili leaps onto Bolg’s back. Shoved to the side, the Orc hadn’t noticed him and Tauriel has a moment to return a smug look of her own, before she kicks viciously at Bolg’s knee, driving him down.

Kili drives his sword down into Bolgs back and the Orc howls and flings Tauriel away from him. She crashes into the icy floor and rolls a few inches until she ends up on her side where she lays dazed, shakily trying to suck in some much needed breaths of air.

Kili is trying to climb higher up on Bolg’s back to gain the leverage he needs for a lethal strike but Bolg won’t stay still and jerks around, attempting to throw him off. Before Kili can carry another downward thrust through, Bolg grabs onto him and sends Kili crashing painfully into the stairs.

Bolg unleashes his weapon, a long metal stake with protrusions at the end that make it resemble a big, thick arrow. There’s something about the slow, deliberate purposefulness of the gesture that makes Tauriel’s blood run cold.

She struggles to get back up even as Kili rolls onto his feet and with a growl leaps down to confront Bolg. His sword clashes with the Orcs weapon and then he ducks as Bolg sweeps a vicious strike at the place where his head used to be.

Kili attacks again and again but his sword scrapes uselessly off of Bolg’s armour and then the Orc catches his arm and with his other hand, smashes Kili in the face. The blow stuns him enough that he staggers and drops his sword, and suddenly, before he can regain his balance, Bolg is grasping him by the front of his chain-mail, his metallic stake raised high.  


As soon as it becomes clear to her what he is about to do, Tauriel throws herself at them with a desperate, “NO!”

She leaps onto Bolg’s back, not knowing what she was going to do, just knowing that she has to do _something_ to stop that cold stake from reaching Kili’s heart. She struggles with him for a moment but it’s useless. Bolg has a firm grip on his weapon and unlike Tauriel who has been travelling and fighting, who is bruised, battered, cut and more than a little exhausted, he still has a plentiful supply of strength left. It feels like barely any time passes before he dislodges her from him, again hurling her to the ground.

Once more the world is blurred by ice and a flash of pain exploding in her skull but somehow she finds the strength to follow her momentum, and roll up onto her hands and feet. She knows she can’t reach him from here, even if she were to fling herself at them again with everything she had. Her daggers are lying about two meters away, which is two meters too far. As Bolg once more lifts his stake she searches herself frantically for some sort of weapon. A hairpin, a forgotten knife – something – anything!

Her fingers close around something smooth and hard in the lining of her uniform. She doesn’t think twice about it. Just gathers every single ounce of what remains of her strength and flings Kili’s promise stone as hard as she can into Bolg’s exposed eye.

Several things happened at once.

The Orc let out a horrific howl. At the same time his thrust shifted several inches to the left as he clutched at his face. It brushed past Kili, piercing through the armour at his side. As Kili dropped to the ground he also let out a cry of pain.

With one hand over his injured eye, Bolg turned slowly to Tauriel exuding a malicious fury that was so palpable it made the hairs at the back of her neck stand on end.

 From behind his hand, blood oozed down his face and through his fingers. Still, she stared him down, getting slowly to her feet, mustering some fury of her own. He’d tried to take away one of the most important people in her life, and he’d been about to do it with a smile. She would never forgive him for it. With a roar, Bolg flung the runestone away from his eye. She watched horrified, as it bounced off the rock wall to the side until it skidded on the ice, bumping into Kili’s leg. He hadn’t gotten up yet but she couldn’t spare a second to even worry because Bolg had adjusted his grip on his stake and was charging at her.

Tauriel forced herself to wait, even though every instinct in her screamed that she should move. To wait, even though he was close enough to touch if she stretched out her hand. To wait until she could see the bloody mess that had been his eye. Only then did she spin on her knees, out of his way. She had the brief satisfaction of watching Bolg clumsily trying to skid to a stop before he went careening over the edge with a scream that went on and on...until it didn’t. Tauriel didn’t move until she heard that telltale thud. Then she scrambled to Kili.

He looked pale but managed a smile when she came into his line of vision. She noted that his breathing was laboured, and that one hand was clasped to his side. She sank down beside him, worried. “Are you hurt?” she asked.

“Nah,” he said with a casualness that reminded her of their conversation in the dungeon.

_Are you reckless?_

“It’s just a scratch.”

But when Tauriel pulled his hand away his fingers were wet with blood.

“Kili” she gasped. Bolg’s stake had taken a significant amount of skin from his side.

“It’s nothing really, it just grazed...” he trailed off underneath Tauriel’s knowing gaze.

“Okay, fine, it hurts like hell and I’ve got a few choice word I’d like to use right now but I’m afraid they’d set your ears on –“

For the second time he’s stopped as Tauriel gently rests her forehead against his.

She nuzzles against him and Kili closes his eyes at the contact, returns the light caresses. She has to work around the lump that has again risen to her throat before she is able to speak.

“I’m really glad you’re okay.” She finally murmurs. She doesn’t tell him how afraid she was that he wouldn’t be but figures he knows anyway by the few tears that escape down her cheek. He cups her face and wipes her tears with his thumbs and tells her, in a voice husky with emotion, how glad he is that she’s okay too.

He presses a lingering kiss to her forehead and is content to just rest against her for a while.

Finally he breaks the silence by saying, “so that’s four times you’ve saved me now?”

Tauriel drew away slightly and grinned, shrugging in false modesty, “hey, who’s counting?”

They both chuckle then. She’s just about to get up when his expression suddenly darkens.

“What?” she asked him, immediately cautious.

 “There’s still someone I’ve got to kill.” He declared grimly. He made to get up and then hissed in pain.  


“Stay still” Tauriel admonished him. “You’re in no condition to be killing anyone”

“I can’t stay still and I have to kill this person” He returned. He explained about Fili about Thorin, watching as her eyes showed first surprise, then horror then grim understanding but not acceptance. He caught her face in his hands again, making her look at him.

“if it were you, and your brother had been hurt, if he might...die,” he struggled over the word, “and if your king, who was more like your father was in danger, what would you do.”

Unbidden, images of Legolas and Thranduil flashed into her mind.

“It’s different.” She insisted, stubbornly.

“Tauriel-”

“My king is cold and stubborn and ruthless when it suits him; it’s not like I should care about whoever –”

“ _Tauriel_ ” he prompted again, amused.

She knew she couldn’t hide the truth. “I would fight for them, I would save them. And if I couldn’t...i would avenge them.”

“Then surely you wouldn’t ask me to do anything different.”

He removed his hands from her face, and she stared at the earnestness and determination written all over his face and then looked away. “No, no I can’t.” She admitted. So instead, she fumbled for the rune stone beside him and began wiping it against her uniform. She was aware of Kili’s eyes on her but couldn’t trust herself to speak just yet. When she was sure nothing even vaguely resembling tears would escape she met his eye and reached for his hand.

He looked surprised first, then alarmed and then horrified as she returned the promise he had given her and closed his fingers over it.

“Tauriel, please don’t there’s no need to –

This time she silences him with a kiss he feels all the way to his toes.

“you promised that you would come back right?” she asks him. Kili nods, a little dazed.

“Then add one more promise to the original; that no matter what happens, you are _not_ going to die here.” She says fiercely.

It flashes in his mind then, for a quick, vivid second, Thorin’s voice.

_Don’t make promises that you can’t keep._

But he’s looking into Tauriel’s face and what he sees melts his heart and his mouth moves before his mind does.

“I promise” he whispers.

She searches his eyes and whatever she finds makes her sag a little with relief.  She’s just hugged him when suddenly, a powerful yell echoes from down the cliff.

“Bolg,” Tauriel says grimly. Her eyes flash fire and he knows what she’s going to do before she does it, which is why before she can stand, he catches one of her arms.

“If you’re going after Azog, I’m going after Bolg” she declares, before he can tell her not to. It’s almost an ultimatum, the way she says it. And he knows there’s absolutely no point in trying to stop her.

“Be careful.” He murmurs instead and Tauriel nods, eyes softening.

“I wanted to tell you – I wanted you to know – Kili, I -”

It’s his turn to interrupt and he does so by gently covering her mouth with his hand. Tauriel’s eyes widen in surprise.

“Don’t” he says softly, and she’s even more surprised by the anguish edging his voice. “Don’t say it because you think this might be the last time you get to, because you don’t know if you’re staying or going, or because I said it first. Don't say it if you only _think_ you do. Say it because it’s true. Say it when you know that you’re going to see me the next morning and the next and the next and will never take it back; when you’re absolutely sure. Because having you say it only to change your mind.”

She tries to tell him that she won’t change her mind but he continues, cutting her off, “ _that_ just might kill me Tauriel.”

She gazes at him, knowing he’s right. He doesn’t remove his hand until she nods and then he gives her a smile that’s only slightly sad and reaches over for his sword. She has to help him to his feet and Kili winces slightly. Then he’s up straight and walking with only the slightest limp.

“See, I told you it was just a scratch.” He joked but Tauriel can’t quite bring herself to smile.

She doesn’t know what to say. After everything, this moment is the one that feels most like she’s about to say goodbye. She’s shown more emotion in the past few days than she has her entire life. She doesn’t want to tell him she thinks she loves him – she wants to be able to say she _knows_ – but at the same time, she can’t just let him go. She tries to say something, _anything_ when he pulls her into a kiss that speaks louder than words; a kiss that touches the depths of her heart, the places that are worried and scared; the places that care; She sinks into him until she doesn’t know where he ends and she begins and all around her is pleasure.

When they finally part, their skin is flushed. He offers her a small grin and now she has it, words that will do until she can speak those she really wants to.

“Please don’t die” she murmured.

The smile on his face flickered and then became inexpressibly tender as he took one of her hands, and placed the rune stone back in it.

“Haven’t you heard,” he told her softly, “I always keep my promises.”

***

Later, she tries to remember how it all went wrong.

She’d waited to see Kili climb up the stairs, before she turned and jumped off the cliff, daggers at the ready to face Bolg.

It had been a long brutal battle even with Legolas’s help. (she had made it clear to him though, that Bolg was hers to kill.) and in the end, it was Tauriel who dislodged Bolg’s head from his shoulders.

After, she remembers exhaustion overtaking her and sinking to the snow. She remembers Legolas’s worried face peering at her as he kneels as well. She ends up sliding to the ground and turning on her back. The world is blurring a little at the edges and she doesn’t have the energy to bother trying to focus. Legolas’s voice is indistinct, as if reaching her from a very long tunnel. She remembers that she liked the look of the sky, which she found ironic. That in place so desolate and cold there could be such unexpected.

She remembers thinking Legolas would leave or try to lift her and then feeling mild surprise when he lay down beside her instead.

She would go and find Kili in just a second. She just needed a moment to rest...just for a second...

She remembers the dark shadows that suddenly passed over her face and her eyes flying open to see the great hawks.

Elation; and as soon as she can, Legolas helps her stand. She searches for Kili, Thorin, Bilbo, Dwalin, all over Ravenhill and when it’s clear there’s no one there, pushes away a flicker of unease and reasons that they’ve gone down to the main fight.

Thranduil is up there as well, searching for his son and there’s a moment where the three of them meet and the tension between them is a tangible thing that crackles in the air and sends chills down her spine. Legolas would have come with her but his father clearly has something he needs to say. Besides, she doesn’t dare test the boundaries of the king’s patience anymore than she already has and she’s in a hurry.

She remembers going down to the main battlefield and seeing the Orcs fleeing; remembers the thunderous cheer that follows as the armies of the free people run them down, remembers feeling happiness so powerful it leaves her giddy.

But its a bittersweet kind of victory.

The battlefield is nothing but mangled corpses as far as the eye can see. Someone’s Kili, someone’s Tauriel, someone’s son, someone’s daughter, brother, sister, someone’s _someone -_ gone forever.

She remembers looking around for Kili, her elation slowly fading into disappointment as the minutes stretch. She thinks he must already be back inside the lonely mountain. Maybe Thorin had been severly injured, she knows Fili had been.

It’s their looks that do it once she’s inside; the way that none of the remaining members of the company excluding (Bilbo, Dwalin and Thorin) can quite look her in the eye when she asks about him, some of them exchange glances, others have their gazes sliding off somewhere near their feet as they murmur something unintelligible. Oin is the only one who can meet her in the eyes and all she sees is compassion.

That, _That_ turns her disappointment into raw, stark fear.

She remembers not being able to think of anything but him as she dashes deeper into the lonely mountain.

She remembers alternately dodging and then following the seemingly endless line of the broken, bloodied bodies of the wounded, wondering if any of them might be him. Her heart lodges itself in her throat at the thought.

She remembers not being able to breathe as she whirls around, looking for the correct hallway before plunging down the one with the loudest screams.

She remembers them barring her way. Bilbo, Dwalin and Oin, a cluster of dwarves and a hobbit looking grieved and yet even in their grief, when Bilbo looks at her, a kind of sympathy, that galvanizes her into action. She’s fully prepared to push her way through, almost does before Balin appears behind her.

“Let her through” he says softly,

And they hesitate for a second, then part ways, and Tauriel plunges inside.

She remembers seeing rows and rows of wounded that seemed innumerable, impossible to count, stretching all the way from one end of the vast hall to the other and elvin healers, scattered among them, a handful of sand flung into a giant the ocean. The survivors that were strong enough were helping here and there by holding down the thrashing limbs of some of the more severe cases being healed.

She remembers, registering with dim surprise, Thranduil, a savage cut on his shoulder, scowling as he’s stitched up temporarily due to the absence of healers. She realises that he must have come down here while she was searching for Kili on the battlefield. Legolas’s absence flits through her mind, here and gone, she’s looking for –

She sees Thorin, pale, looking almost dead except for the shallow rise and fall of his chest. There’s a gaping wound in his foot and blood soaking his midriff. She remembers her stomach turning uncomfortably.

She remembers the moment she spots him, the way time seems to slow, her heart seems to stop, sound seems to cease. She remembers breathing, finally, consciously breathing.

She remembers taking a step towards him, a smile forming only to realize that _he’s_ not breathing, that he looks worse off than Thorin, a savage gash spanning diagonally across the length of his chest, from shoulder to hip, the wound at his leg reopened, not to mention the one at his side; his uniform drenched with blood.

She remembers hearing her first sound, his name, soft and confused and wavering, “kili?” and realizing only later that it had come from her.

She remembers it building inside her, something like a scream, something like a moan as they lift him out of the makeshift stretcher and onto a bed of rock, healers suddenly swarming around.

She remembers that before she can crumple, strong hands take her arm and give it a gentle squeeze. Legolas is suddenly beside her, but his gaze is averted away from her, his eyes on Kili as he mutters, “not here.”

He takes her hand, and if there were any room in her to feel surprised she would. She feels a dozen eyes on them, dwarves and elves; the impression of Thranduil’s icy gaze which, this time, does nothing; she’s numb against it and Legolas meets his father’s eyes steadily until Thranduil looks away.

She remembers being led down a series of hallways that blur into insignificance in her mind, Legolas finding an empty room. Late afternoon sunlight filters in from one small window to the side of a small bed that was pushed against the wall.

She remembers feeling like something inside her is going to shatter, remembers asking Legolas to please leave. He pauses and then says no – not stubborn, not aggressive, simply no.

She remembers tucking her knees underneath her chin and curling inwards, mortified at the tears she can no longer keep back, at this uncommon show of weakness and emotion among elves. She remembers asking- no demanding that he leave and again having him deny her.

She remembers adding, “Legolas please,” her voice cracking. Instead he comes to take a seat beside her and his next words rob her of the last of her self-control. “we’ve known each other for five hundred years Tauriel,” he says gently, “you don’t have to pretend with me.”

She really does cry then. Deep, heart-wrenching sobs as Legolas pulls her into the circle of his arms and tucks her head under his chin.

She remembers a moment centuries ago, with the sting of Legolas’s mother’s death still fresh in the minds and hearts of all those in the woodland realms even though centuries had passed. A younger Legolas was hiding in a crevice in the walls of the castle, his face buried in his knees.

She remembers hesitating (he was the prince after all and technically far older than her) before climbing cautiously into the crevice and settling down beside him (because he was hurting and he was her friend).

She remembers Legolas trying to stop crying immediately, chocking on his own sobs as he tries to reign them in.

She remembers his sharp “get out!” and her smaller, younger self pulling her knees up to her chest and resting her head on them to peer at him.

“I’ve known you for decades Legolas. You don’t have to pretend with me.”

She remembers it takes a handful of seconds for his face to crumble and then she’s pulling him into her arms, her head resting on the back of his as he cries against her.

She knows that Legolas now is returning the favour, that she’s never felt anything as tender as his hands on her back, the useless jumble of soothing words he murmurs in elvish into her hair and turning her head into his chest, she cries all the more.

For the life of her, she just can’t remember how it all went wrong.


	7. Sleepless

She’s just pulled herself together when she hears loud knocking on the door. In an instant she’s up and swinging it open. Oin is standing in the doorway, looking a great deal more frazzled then he usually did. a white kerchief that looked distinctly hobbit-like dabbed at the perspiration on his forehead and neck. He had a message for her which he delivered quickly in short, urgent sentences.

“Stay here. Don’t let anyone else see you for now and don’t come into the recovery room; the last thing anyone needs is some smartass deciding to start a fight or throwing around false accusations if everything goes South. Thorin, kili and Fili are very badly hurt but there’s a chance – there’s always a chance. Sit tight and as soon as I can I’ll come back for you.”

Relief rushed through her, so powerful she became weak with it but as he turned to hurry away she managed to stall him with a hand on his shoulder. “He’s alive?” she asked, her voice rough.

Oin looked at her from the corner of his eye and patted the hand on his shoulder. He didn’t even need to ask who she was talking about. “Aye lass, he’s alive...for now.” He gave her an apologetic look before he hurried off.

Tauriel let the door close and stepped back, sagging onto the bed and trying to process what had just happened. Kili was alive. For now. Fresh tears suddenly came to her eyes, tears of relief that she quickly wiped away. Crying wasn’t going to do anything now and she’d had enough of tears – she was behaving worse than a human.

All she had to do now... was wait.

 

***

 

Waiting was torture.

At first, Legolas does a pretty good job of persuading her to get some rest and though she had tried to protest he could be even more stubborn than she could when he put his mind to it.

Now that some of the tension of the past few hours had abated she couldn’t deny that she was both emotionally and physically drained. He’d offered to take up watch and wake her up as soon as Oin came around. She’d pointed out that she was supposed to be guarding _him_ but Legolas only smiled and reminded her of all the times she had saved him. He wanted to return the favour; besides, he’d continued, what were friends for? The reminder that he was there for her, touched her.

She had tried to be reasonable then and at least lie down and Legolas took up his position on the floor with his back against the door. Considering he’d chosen to rest his sword in easy reach on his knee, she suspected he also wanted to stay alert in case of any unpleasant surprises. This was a foreign castle after all.

She had never truly intended to go to sleep but it didn’t matter; sleep came for her, reaching with gentle hands to shut her eyes and pull her down, down into a comforting sea of of oblivion.

Inevitably, memories of Kili diffused into her dreams: His smile, the sparkle in his eyes and one of her favourites - Kili with his arms around her and her head against his chest, being lulled to sleep by the rhythmic sound of his heart. It felt so real she sighed and tried to move closer to him. Kili tightened his arms around her and for a while she was purely content.

It took her a moment to note when the steady thump of his heartbeat stopped. When she did, she pulled back sleepily and gasped in shock because her Kili had been replaced by a pale corpse looking back at her through dark, dead eyes.

“Tauriel” the imaged groaned and tightened its arms around her. It leaned closer –

She struggled against its tight grasp, trying to pull away. It’s cold grey lips were hovering over hers –

And Tauriel threw herself back with all her strength.

A jarring thud went through her body and she awoke with a gasp. Instantly she rolled to her feet and whipped out her daggers. Something was moving towards her. Her blades were against its neck before she realized it was Legolas.

Immediately she lowered her weapons, appalled. “I’m so sorry, forgive me Legolas, I didn’t mean – ” disoriented, she couldn’t help checking around her, her heart still pounding. It was only a nightmare. Just a nightmare. She hadn’t had a nightmare for centuries – not since her parents had died.

This was a bad sign.

“Tauriel.” Legolas said gently, gaining her attention. He stepped forward carefully and cupped her face, looking into her wide eyes. “it was just a bad dream, okay? Everything’s fine”

It still takes her a moment to calm down but when she does, she nods her head and sheathes her daggers, a little embarrassed – the captain of Thranduil’s guard overreacting because of a simple dream.

Still.

She doesn’t try to sleep again. And Legolas doesn’t try to make her.

Questions about Kili plague her all night : if he’s alright, if it had been too late for the healers to save him; if they had managed to save him, would he make it through the night and why Oin hasn’t come back yet; it feels like forever has passed.

She can’t sit still; she needs to move, to _do_ something and ends up restlessly pacing the room. In her hand she’s got his promise and she keeps hold of it, her fingers moving over the stones surface until she’s memorized the shape of the inscription though she doesn’t yet know what it means.

Even though he can’t hear her, she’s pleading with him to be alright

Not knowing what’s happening is killing her because it allowed her both to hope with all her heart that he would be fine and fear that at any second that hope would be snatched from her.

Every time she hears footsteps near their room her heart speeds up and she turns expectantly towards the door but each time the footsteps pass by and her disappointment is just a little more devastating, her anxiety just a little more intense.

Once she lunges for the door, determined and desperate to see him but Legolas blocks her, his hand over the handle. He gives her a slow shake of his head, eyes compassionate but serious. She wants to argue to plead to beg but she knows it’s for the best and Legolas won’t budge no matter what she does.

With a groan she goes back to pacing until she herself grows sick of the unending sound of her boots against the ground. She doesn’t stop though, because that would mean she’s doing absolutely nothing and that’s even worse.

Hours pass and she’s close to knocking her head on a wall, to tears of frustration, of fear and anger when Legolas starts humming.

 It takes a moment for the melody to register but when it does, Tauriel slows her pacing to listen... and eventually stops altogether.

His voice is soft and low and there’s something about the song he’s humming that’s both haunting and soothing; a balm to her mind and heart. It pulls her in, unburdens her of her thoughts and fears and worries and carries her along until it is all that exists.

It takes her a moment to notice when he stops and when she does she swallows, suddenly feeling more drained than she can remember as everything she was feeling rushes back. She allows herself to slowly sink to the ground, placing her head between her knees. Her throat is thick again.

“what song is that?” she asks him huskily.

“just something my father used to sing to me when my mother passed away. It used to help.”

She nods, his words causing a pang in her heart and as If he could tell he had hurt her Legolas murmured – “Tauriel I’m not saying he’s dead –”

“Will you sing it for me?” she interrupted him.

All she wanted was to be able to not think about anything for a little while. Legolas hesitated for only a second before he complied.

His voice was soft and a little unsure but rich though it wasn’t that which soothed her. The song itself was unlike anything she had ever heard - lilting, captivating and achingly simple - It weaves a spell over her, enchanting and deep. The lyrics slip through her ears like water, cool and sweet and she makes no effort to hold onto the words, just lets the hauntingly beautiful melody wash over her. There’s anguish in the flow of the music, heartache woven through and Tauriel feels like the sound is reaching for her soul, binding itself with her pain, becoming one with her heart. She closes her eyes and lets the sound sink into her, making no effort to stop the tears that roll down her cheeks now.

When he’s done she opens her eyes and meets his in the darkness. There’s a question on his face and when he looks at her, apparently he sees the answer. Softly, once more he starts singing and Tauriel lies down on the cold stone floor, content to listen.

They stay like that till Oin comes. Neither of them sleeps.

***

It’s sometime in the early morning when he does show up; she can smell dew in the air, knows the feel of that period just before sunrise when the world is still dark and slumbering.

His appearance releases a nervous flurry of butterflies in her stomach. He looks as exhausted as she feels, eyes dim, clothes ragged, mouth down-turned. He musters up a small smile for her though and that’s all Tauriel needs to take her first consciously deep breath for the past few hours, finally allowing herself to relax.

_He’s not dead._

They don’t talk on the way to the recovery room but the silence is welcome rather than oppressive.

_He’s not dead._

It repeats in her head with every step.

When they finally get there, Oin hesitates before opening the door, giving Tauriel a look she can’t decipher. Then, to her surprise, he takes one of her hands and gives it a squeeze before patting it gently. “Just remember lass, he’s a tough one.”

His words cause her anxiety to return as he swings the door open.

She’d expected there to be other dwarfs surrounding the bed but the room is empty except for the three recovering occupants. A large fireplace is at one end of the room and is closest to Thorin, with Fili in the middle and Kili at the end.  Kili is lying on his back, fast asleep, breathing. She doesn’t understand what the elder dwarf was talking about; he looks fine.

She watches the gentle rise and fall of his chest for a moment and let’s it sink in; really sink in that he’s alive. When it does there’s a soft smile stretching across her face. She’s walking to him even before she’s made a conscious decision to.

The door closes behind them and Fili suddenly wakes up, rubbing his eyes. He sits up and Tauriel pauses, uncertain.

He looks a little tired and a little pale but apart from the patch she can see under his shirt, none the worse for wear. She knows what protocol dictates; its only right to greet him first and wish him well but she’s taken no more than a few steps towards him when he gives her a small smile, shakes his head and gives a nod in his brother’s direction.

Tauriel gratitude and the sudden rush of liking she feels for him is expressed in a grin. she thinks after Kili and Oin he just might be her new favorite person in this kingdom.

There’s a small chair beside Kili’s bed and it suddenly occurs to her that the others had been here earlier and OIn and Fili must have planned things this way – called her after everyone had visited to give her time alone with him. She turns to Oin with a question in her eyes and he smiles, shrugs and makes a shooing motion with his hands towards Kili.

There’s a whole lot of compassion and kindness in that small room. And they barely know her. Even among her own people, there’s never been anything close. It’s enough to warm her heart, to drive the last cold shadows of the night’s anxieties far from her.

Kili’s sleeping form - peaceful, serene - is a sight for sore eyes and she can’t help releasing a small sigh of relief, of pleasure.  The grievous looking wounds he sustained in battle are covered by his shirt but she trusts the Elvin healers enough that she’s not worried.  Not wanting to wake him up she touches him cautiously: tracing the line from his hip to his shoulder with just her fingertips - feeling the thin raised ridge that will shrink down into a nearly imperceptible scar with time; her palm against his warm cheek, thumb lightly stroking, combing gently through his thick, dark hair with tender fingers. She feels an impulse to check and can’t resist laying her head on his chest, against his heart.

The sound of his heartbeat, strong and sure makes her smile and again a sense of relief, like a breath of fresh air in what had been a dark stuffy room washes over her.  It really had been just a dream. She knows that technically she’s being watched but doesn’t care as she presses a kiss first over his heart and then on his forehead. When she straightens, she gently strokes his cheek with the knuckles of her hand and Fili is looking at her quietly and thoughtfully.

“You really do care about my brother, don’t you?”

Tauriel regards him without the slightest bit of hesitancy or doubt. “yes, I do.” she confirms softly.

Oin is regarding her with the same thoughtful look Fili is.

Legolas gives her a small smile of support, and if it is a little pained, Tauriel is sorry to have caused it but she will not hide this simple truth anymore.

Fili exchanges a look with Oin. And the sense of unease Tauriel felt just before she entered returns, and grows. She’s about to ask what’s going on when Fili beckons her towards him.

A little surprised, she complies.

When she’s close enough he takes her hand and presses a chaste kiss to the back of it and Tauriel is even more surprised.

 “My lady,” he greets her respectfully. “we are ever in your debt for the aid you have rendered us tonight. Were it not for you, we might all very well have been dead. I want you to know that if there is ever anything you need, anything we can do for you, all you have to do is ask.”

It’s a different Fili she’s seeing; a much more solemn and mature dwarf than the one she met earlier.  Perhaps almost dying had that effect on a person. She gives him a small smile and inclines her head lightly in acknowledgement of his thanks but can’t resist correcting him of his misapprehension. “I appreciate your kindness although I should warn you, I am no lady, as I have been reminded many times.”

She smiles drily but Fili only gives her hand a squeeze, his expression serious, earnest, “you saved my brother’s life and ours more than once. I can assure you Tauriel, you will always be a lady to me.”

“and to me” Oin speaks up in agreement, giving her a smile.

Tauriel looks from one dwarf to the other, touched and not quite sure how to respond. In the end she doesn’t have to – Fili presses another small kiss to the back of her hand and Tauriel gives his hand a little squeeze, warmed by the courtesy. Fili turns his attention to Legolas and gives him a polite nod. “My gratitude to you as well, Lord Legolas” and his voice is no less sincere, no less earnest.

Legolas returns the nod and the room is suddenly lighter, pleasant.

It would have been so easy to for everything to stay that way but soon enough Fili turns to her, eyes dark and troubled. Tauriel feels her stomach do an uncomfortable flip. This was it, what they’d been dancing around so far.

“My Lady,” Fili begins gravely, his voice a murmur, “there’s something you should know.”

***

Tauriel is reeling.

She doesn’t realize it until Oin places one of the chairs by the bedside behind her and Legolas gently urges her inside only to have the sickening dizziness remain.

Moon-sleep. That’s what they called it. To the dwarfs and even humans it happened rarely, mostly after instances of great trauma to the body, soul or spirit. Both Kili and Thorin suffered from it.

 In ancient times, the elves could induce this sleep through a rare herb that has long since ceased to be found. Through it, they could travel through dreams, through time and space, through the very life force of nature itself and become one with the knowledge of all things past, all things present and all things to come. But even they couldn’t control when they woke up – a day, an hour, a century from the time they slept – it was impossible to tell.

But elves were immortal and Dwarfs were not.

The room was warm but Tauriel was trembling.

All three men watched her silently and gravely, waiting for her reaction. She felt like she was right on the verge of hysteria – of laughing or crying – she wasn’t sure which. Kili wasn’t dead – no - but he wasn’t quite alive either he was...asleep? A never ending sleep that had no natural end; a sleep he couldn’t be brought out of. He’d lie here and maybe... one day, a month, a hundred years from now he would wake up...

or maybe he wouldn’t.

She doesn’t realize she’s doing both, laughing and crying until Legolas takes a step towards her, his expression worried. She clasps a hand over her mouth, waves him away and rises, turning her back to all three of them. It takes her a moment to regain control and even then her steps are unsteady as she moves to Kili’s bed.

She’s horrified to realize she can see the difference between this and normal sleep now : The serenity in his features has taken on an unnatural quality. His face is like a ripple- free pond, smooth as glass. There is no furrow of the eyebrow, quiver of the mouth, flutter of his eyelashes to disturb the surface of his features. It’s almost as if his body is here, but the real Kili is far away.

And this – this is reality, not a dream.

She doesn’t hold back now; she doesn’t have it in herself to. She cups one of his hands in both of hers and presses a kiss to it before placing slow, tender kisses over his forehead, his eyes, his nose, and his cheeks; runs her hand one more time through his hair before finally leaning over and pressing the softest kiss yet to his lips.

She urges him to come back to her.

Nothing happens. There’s no one there. She buries her face into his chest, muffling her pained moan against his shirt. She has no tears left to cry, and even if she had this hurt is deeper than tears.

She’d thought him dying was the worst thing she could face but this is a different kind of anguish – even more devastating because it was so completely unexpected. Dead and alive had been her options but to somehow have him be both – to be right here but to be gone, to be with her but not - _that_ was a torment she didn’t know how to bear. And if the heavens sought to punish her for loving him in the first place, they were doing a fantastic job because this,

 _this..._ was pain beyond compare.

***

She doesn’t know how long she sits in the chair at his bedside and rests her head against him listening to his heartbeat, eyes dry and red and raw. Legolas and Oin reach the decision to leave at the same time soon after she settles in the chair and Fili turns his back, giving her some privacy. The appreciation she feels for the gesture is dull and she considers that maybe something in her has fallen asleep as well because all she feels is numb.

The only thing in the world that can move her now is Thranduil’s summons.

She’s surprised by how much time has passed while she was in the recovery room; its late afternoon when she leaves with the sky starting to turn that orange that indicates that sunset will be approaching soon.

She makes her way to her king with heavy steps and a heavier heart not even finding a place for fear or apprehension. The two guards in front of Thranduil’s tent share a look when they see her approaching. There’s something in their eyes – something like curiosity, something like respect - but Tauriel doesn’t care to decipher it.

The king’s back is to her when she enters. He’s returned to his royal robes and considering the fact he’s sipping what she’s sure is wine from a silver goblet, seems none the worse for wear. Smoothly, she slides onto one knee, her fist to her heart and face downwards. She knows that she’s here to face punishment. Thinks that after everything that has happened, there’s nothing else he can do to her. She’s not afraid, not proud, not anything.

She surrenders.

“My Lord.” She greets him softly.

And slowly, Thranduil turns to face her.

***

He took his time turning around and when he did, he was careful to keep his face inscrutable as he regarded the kneeling Tauriel.

For all the fire she had shown yesterday afternoon, she seemed perfectly docile now, her face toward the ground; Then again, he knew how quickly that calm could gave way to tempestuous passion.

He’d called her here in part, because he was ready for a final confrontation; No Legolas, no interruptions, no one to come running to her aid. He wanted her to rant and rave and argue and this time...

He would listen.

She’d been largely right about almost everything: the situation in Mirkwood forest, the spread of evil across their lands and the inevitability of their confrontation with darkness; he’d shrunk back from the idea, brushing off her heated words as youthful recklessness and folly but now, he had seen for himself how bold the Orcs had gotten; how very real the threat to them was. she thought him a coward but she was wrong about that; he was a king, doing his best to protect the families, lovers and friends that put their hope, faith and immortal lives in his hands.

But, in trying so hard to protect them, he threatened to destroy them all.

Legolas had repeated Tauriel’s words from long ago to him on Ravenhill and they had rung in his ears all the way down his descent; right up till the point a stray Orc had attempted to ambush him and managed to land a savage cut across his shoulder before he could be disposed of.

_“When did we let evil become stronger than us”_

Lying down in the makeshift ward with a young human stitching up his shoulder, he’d looked around at the Elvin healers spread out among the wounded, with the humans and dwarfs coming together to aid them and realized with a pang that once again the times had changed and the only reason his people were still stuck isolated in the past...was him.

The realization was like having cold water flung in his face; he’d thought the problem was that elves like Tauriel were too young, too naive; it had never occurred to him to think that maybe _he_ was too old; had seen too much, remembered too much, held too many century long grudges as close to his heart as if they had happened yesterday...

so yes, she’d been right and looking down at her, Thranduil was torn between offering an apology...and demanding one because however right she had been, the way she’d gone about proving it was unacceptable. _No one_ threatened the king and her punishment would certainly follow but in the meantime...

He was curious.

About a number of things actually. He’d seen her reaction when she’d spotted the injured dwarf, seen her devastation in the shock written across her face and wondered if she _really_ did think herself in love with him and if so, what exactly was her relationship with his son because Legolas was unable to return immediately to Mirkwood and would be journeying to see Strider soon; partly because of him he knew but at least largely because of Tauriel.

He stayed silent for so long that Tauriel sneaked a peak at him from under her lashes.

He almost smiled.

Instead, he commanded her to look at him. And for the first time since entering she met his gaze.

But there was something wrong. He’d been expecting those lively green eyes of hers to be filled with defiance, with determination or some other resilient bull-headed emotion but instead there’s ...nothing. No heat, no fire no light, no pride, no life, nothing; almost as if something deep inside her has died.

He walks slowly around her, considering; surprised by the change until Tauriel herself prompts him.

“My Lord?”

Thranduil takes care to pull his inscrutable mask back on though inside his curiosity has peaked – what exactly had happened to the dwarf? He’d seen a number of healers around him, and after being transferred to a different room had naturally assumed he would be alright. And even if he wasn’t, did she really care _that_ much for the dwarf, he wondered.

What he said was, “So, now I am once again your Lord...Go on, amuse me. What do you have to say for yourself about your actions yesterday?” he makes sure his voice is casual – cool and detached with just the right hint of sarcasm- while inside he ponders the changes in her.

Elves bore hardship, both physical and emotional far better than other species but it had a downside; an elf could walk around drowning in a sea of despair and it would hardly show except to those who had eyes to see; he should know, after his wife had died he’d done it for years. He had eyes to see and what he saw troubled him.

For a moment Tauriel says nothing and then she bows her head once more, “I am sorry my Lord. It was wrong of me to turn my weapon against you. Whatever punishment you see fit to give, I will accept.”

Again Thranduil pauses, surprised. “Even your life?” he can’t help but enquire.

Again there is another short pause, a spark of something flickers in her eyes and then Tauriel takes out one of her daggers and offers it to him. “Even my life, my Lord”

Thranduil stops, incredulous. Then slowly, he feels the first hints of irritation rise. There’s something about the submission of her posture, the surrender of it that’s getting to him.

“And what about everything you said, about fighting back and joining forces – about not turning away? Was all that just talk?”

Again Tauriel hesitates, for a longer period of time before she says, “you may do as you wish my Lord.”

His eyes narrow at her response. “And you have nothing to say about me leaving the dwarfs to die, about all the time spent hiding behind walls, no future suggestions, unspoken condemnation?”

He can barely believe what he’s saying, but even more unbelievable to him is that the only reaction even these words get is another tiny flicker of response, a candle flame being snuffed out by the wind.

“My lord you already know my views on the matter but...you should not trust them. you were right, I was naive. Fighting does not always mean winning and sometimes...sometimes the price we pay is too steep.” her voice is husky and Thranduil loses some of his irritation because yes...yes it was.

 “I thought your argument was that those losses were worth it – ”

“My argument was based on not having to bear those losses at all, " her voice has sharpened,  "real life doesn’t work that way”

“Then tell me about your dream.”

“why!?” she demands, suddenly upset, surging to her feet, “what do I know about keeping those I love close to me, about loss, about life; what do I know about anything!” she exclaims. “I’ve lived for six hundred years and I might as well have been born yesterday – ”                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                          

“You know about integrity, about honour- ” he interjects

“Ideals, this is reality-”

He raises his voice, frustrated by her outlook, “You know about not running away from your challenges but facing them head on – ”

“For all the good that does me!” she nearly shouts, anguished. He is surprised.

She gazes at him and then as if suddenly remembering herself, smooths her expression over. She’s been spending too much time around him, he thinks. Any other day and he might have been amused. Now his frown returns and deepens as Tauriel tries to recede into herself once more.

“My apologies my Lord, you should find yourself another captain of the guard - one not taken with fanciful illusions that do no one any good.”

He shouldn’t be so affected, but the idea of her abandoning her beliefs – beliefs she had put so much heart in - her standing, when she’s so right, when she’s one of the few lights in this world that might truly stand a chance at driving away the darkness that plagues them; when she’s just won him over, because of a dwarf, infuriates him.

It’s a cold fury though that burns in his voice as he speaks. “You are behaving like a fool.”

Tauriel’s head snaps upwards as though he’s slapped her. Then she gives him a wavering smile that smacks again of being alarmingly close to tears, “that’s apparently all I do nowadays.”

She bows again, stiffly and swiftly turns to go. He shouldn’t say it he knows but he wants a reaction, wants to snap her out it.

“Unbelievable” he mutters coldly, “One little dalliance with a foreign prince – one little mishap and you throw away everything! I knew you were many things Tauriel– some of which I’d even begun to admire – but fickle and weak I would have never thought part of them!”

“It was not some dalliance!” she whirls around, and answers his ice with pure fire that stuns him, though it doesn’t completely displease him; finally a little life.

“It wasn’t some childish infatuation; it wasn’t some meaningless heated attraction. After I’d confronted you on the day of the battle of five armies, even I hadn’t been sure. Now I am; Now I am not scared anymore except it may be too late to ever tell him that because I wasted the time we had hesitating about taking him as mine, worrying about what everyone else would think...so maybe I am weak – ” she trails off and swallows. Her hands clench into fists against her thighs. It takes him a moment to realize she's trembling.

He waits, sombre and steadily more surprised at the strength of her reaction though he’s finally getting somewhere with her.

“’But I am not fickle.” she continues, her voice quite now but intense. “I know what I said, and I know what I believed, what I still believe but it hurts when it is someone _you_ have lost for the greater good; Forgive me, if I’m not rushing to tell you to sacrifice more of your people just yet.” she has to take a breath because her voice is husky with emotion and wavering. when she continues, her voice is far softer, “The maddening thing though is that i will say it eventually, because if i don't everyone who has ever lost someone in this renewed war against darkness would have lost them for nothing...if darkness wins, it was all meaningless. I am sorry I insulted you though and said that there was no love in you. I didn’t understand – ” her voice cracks and Tauriel needs another moment to steady it, “I didn’t understand how much it must hurt you to lose even one soldier, but I fear my king that you may have forgotten not loss... but what it truly means to love anyone other than your son.”

It’s his turn to feel as if he’s been slapped. Her gaze on him is almost pitying and if it weren’t for the tears already in her eyes he might be tempted to snap at her. As it was he clenched and unclenched his jaw, forcing himself to remain civil.

“and now you know what it means to love someone other than my son” he asks drily, the humour in his voice not reaching his eyes.

She gives him a smile that twists into a look of pain and she covers her mouth with her hand and shakes her head at him. She can’t speak. Again, he’s surprised by the depth of her emotions and his anger fades away. She bends over without making any sound but it’s painfully clear she is in agony.

Tauriel holds herself until she can straighten and when she does Thranduil finds himself staring at raw grief; he knows that face, had won it for decades after Ellerien’s death and it hurt's to see that face reflecting back at him, to see someone as young as Tauriel wearing it now.

“What happened to him?” he murmurs gently.

“They call it moon-sleep. He's deeply unconscious, sleep is as good a word as any. He might wake up, or he might stay like that for– ” was as far as she got before Tauriel lifted her hand to her mouth and bit down to stop the surge of her emotions. And while she may have succeeded in not giving way to tears, she can’t avoid making this sound, this soft groaning from feelings that could not be uttered that were killing him.

Involuntarily he took a step towards her and then halted, realizing that he hadn’t comforted anyone, not even Legolas in centuries – that he had no idea what to do; And he’s watching her - trembling, tortured, desperately trying to be strong and failing and has no idea what to do with himself, how to make it better. Because in truth, this wasn’t the kind of pain that could simply be soothed anything other than time and even then, there will always be a place that aches for that person you have lost; that is just the way it is.

Suddenly she stops and looks at him with eyes that are red-rimmed, filled with tears that had not fallen. “If this is love, I do not want it, take it from me, please” she pleaded quietly, taking an involuntary step towards him.

Thranduil looked at her, pained. If only it were that easy.

“Why does it hurt so much?” she asked, bewildered, looking to him for an answer. She was shaking again with the effort of holding herself together.

“Because it was real,” he finally says, humbled, his voice raw. He’d been so very wrong.

She regards him for a moment, absorbing the truth for herself. It must have hurt her as much as it pleased her to have him admit it because suddenly, with a small gasp, Tauriel’s emotions run away from her and her tears slip down her cheeks.

She tries and fails to pull herself together and eventually Tauriel resorts to biting the back of her fist to prevent sobs.

 “Tauriel – ” Thranduil begins softly, taking another step towards her. He wants to tell her that there’s no point in trying to hold it in, to save face in front of him, she should just let go but in the end he doesn’t say anything; he’s the last person she’d want to hear this from.

He watches her pained; reliving his own grief for his wife, for those who had died in his kingdom, children just like her, under his care that he had failed.

Just when he decides he can’t stand it anymore, Tauriel’s teeth sink into her hand.

“Tauriel!” he says, alarmed. In an instant he’s in front of her, whisking away her hand from her mouth. There’s a circle of crimson indentations in her skin; she actually bit down hard enough to pierce it.

He looks down at this elf who for the past few centuries has been the closest thing to a daughter he’s ever had and feels a pang of remorse; Legolas had always been been the most open recipient of his affections – how could he not be? – he was the only part of his beloved wife he had left – her eyes, her smile, her compassion, her stubborn determination. But Tauriel he had always kept at a distance. His heart was safe with Legolas – he was part of a love he had already known; Tauriel was a wild card and Thranduil would not risk loving anyone else again. So again, she’d been both wrong and right – he hadn’t forgotten how to love; he’d simply _chosen_ not to.

Still, in many ways Tauriel was a lot like Legolas  especially where her compassion and stubborn determination were concerned and had somehow managed to worm her way under his defenses though he went to a great deal of effort not to show it. He’d always treated her like just another member of the guard if, albeit a more favoured one and now, seeing the young elf regarding him with wide, surprised eyes filled with tears, he couldn’t help seeing all the ways in which he had truly failed Tauriel as a guardian, and as a father.

And maybe he can’t make up for all those years but at least, right here and now, there’s something he can do.

The elf king steps forward and gently brings her head down to rest on his shoulder. Tauriel gasps, the intimacy of the gesture surprising her and for a second causing her to forget her pain.

But that is just for a second. His compassion, after everything she’d done and everything she’d said, however true, was somehow worse than his anger; now she really knew what it felt like to lose someone. To have them taken away from you; right under your nose - to have them slip through your fingers. It was worse than losing her parents because at least then she hadn’t been strong enough to fight for them but now she was strong enough to fight for Kili; and she had and she’d still lost. And this was how he felt whenever there was war, whenever another elf who should have had forever dropped to the ground. She‘d had no idea.

Her face crumples against him and she grasps the front of his robes and turns her face into his chest, silently sobbing.

She’d said there was no love in him and yet now would give anything to have no love in her as well. For five hundred years, he’d been there for her in the as small a way as possible, making it certain that a wide royal line divided them that she should never cross. and for centuries she had accepted, understood, fought for her king with everything she had anyway - because he'd saved her, because he'd fought and _won_ \- only to get a small smile that maybe could have been pride, or pleasure and a wave of his hand in dismissal. and for five hundred years that had been enough. and today, after she’d pointed an arrow in his face, defied and disobeyed him he was suddenly here for her once again,  just as he had been when the Orcs descended on her hometown; except now, he was here for her completely; was holding her against him and gently stroking her hair, his head resting against hers. There was no dividing line.

She’d always thought that Legolas had gotten his kindness from his mother and now she could see that at least part of that had always come from his father. And, she realised as Thranduil brought her even closer -

for the first time in forever...maybe her father too.

***

After she runs out of tears, he wants to keep her with him.

He waits until there are no more hiccups, until her breathing returns to normal before he finally releases her gives her a fine linen cloth to dry her tears.

She’s not sure how to react afterwards at first and for lack of anything else to say points out that she’s ruined the silk of his robe. Thranduil looks at the wet spot that’s formed on the delicate fabric and suddenly starts chuckling. It’s only then she feels some of the awkwardness and tension building inside her dissolve.

But still she can't stay. It's been an overwhelming day and as much as this moment means to her -She feels lighter, cleaner – hollow now instead of heavy - she’s also disoriented by the turn things have taken; by the change in  _him;_ she needs to walk it off, to process and breathe, to recover and think. She knows he understands. still as she's leaving she can't resist one act of extreme impulse and turns back for a hug that surprises him only a little more than it does her. she doesn't hold on long enough for his arms to come around her but thinks that as she let's go and hurries to the exit, she catches the first hints of a smile.

He sends his guards to accompany her and she's touched enough to tolerate them as far as the dining hall of the castle before sending them back as politely as she can. It sounds like all the dwarfs are gathered here. She hesitates, not really wanting to face them or anyone, but not wanting to be alone with her thoughts just yet.

She tries to find it again – that place inside her where she feels nothing – but try as she might, she can’t quite reach it.

She ends up walking into the dining hall just like that, a little destabilized, a little overwhelmed, her heart sensitive and a little raw after everything that had happened.

The giant doors of the dining hall open and close with a loud groan. She’s hardly taken a few steps inside before she finds that all activity in the hall has ceased and every eye is on her.

It’s enough to unsettle anyone. For a moment, she considers simply turning back when suddenly,  she hears someone call her name from the centre of the hall.

“Tauriel!”

Her heart does a painful little twist in her chest because the voice is awfully familiar to Kili’s.

It’s Fili, standing up from his bench to wave her over.

Tauriel hadn’t expected that his offer of thanks would stretch so far as to giving her, a stranger, a place among his brethren but she appreciates the gesture, finds her respect and appreciation for Fili rise a little higher.

Oin, Fili and bofur are the only ones that seem pleased to see her. Bilbo is polite but clearly curious and as she sinks onto a bench beside Fili and another strange, older dwarf with a beard, she can’t help noting that the expressions of the rest of the dwarfs range from surprised to confused to uncomfortable to utterly grim.

It’s an awkward moment.

Any other time and she might have been tempted to burst out laughing.

Now she just sits until Fili broke uncomfortable pause by offering her her pick of food on the table which was pretty limited; After the battle no one had had time to hunt or harvest or purchase any food and all they have is the excesses from the elves supply.

she reaches for a roll of bread and takes a small bite from it and as if that’s a signal, the rest of the dwarfs in the hall, including those at her table return to eating though there’s a great deal of whispering and stolen glances directed at her.

She ignores all of them and nibbles at her bread without tasting it.

The company eats in silence. There’s the occasional hidden glance at her and unanswered questions in some eyes but as long as they don’t actually ask her anything she’s fine just sitting.

There’s something about watching the dwarfs struggle with the leafy lettuce and grimace at each other over their meager share of greens that threatens to cheer her up after everything.

Occasionally Fili catches her eye and makes some ridiculous face and manages to coax a smile from the corner of her mouth.

Still. It’s not long before the huge stone cavern they’re sitting in becomes suffocating and the noise becomes oppressive.

She needs air, the sky, to be outside. As soon as she thinks it she’s up on her feet taking the members of the company by surprise. She pauses long enough to give a polite nod to Fili and Oin first and then the rest before she turns to leave. She doesn’t answer Fili when he asks her where she’s going because she doesn’t yet know.

She doesn’t stop walking until she bursts out of the castle and onto a balcony where she sags against the railings and forces herself to breathe deeply.

Its late sunset and the sky is beautiful, a powerful mix of purple, red and orange as the sun sinks low in the sky. Before her is a grand view of Erebor – of the mountain slopes and previously abandoned town. The battlefield is almost clear of bodies. The reminder of death makes her feel queasy and Tauriel lifts her eyes away, and again forces herself to breathe. In and out, so much has happened today both good and bad and her heart aches with the weight of it. Short of detaching her heart from her body all she can do is breathe through it.

In and out.

She stays here till nightfall.

***

It’s Bilbo who eventually comes to get her.

The hobbit is polite and a perfect gentleman who asks for and receives her permission before coming to stand beside her. She’s spent very little time with him on this journey but there’s something about him that endears him to her – whether it’s the peaceable air he carries with him or the fact that seeing him makes her think of rolling green hills, small comfortable houses, and warm baking pies and calming tea - either way she likes the hobbit and his presence soothes rather than aggravates; enough that even when it’s clear he has something to say she doesn’t tense but stands quietly, waiting for him to speak.

“so...you’re Tauriel then” Bilbo eventually ventures. It’s not really a question, so Tauriel doesn’t answer, just lifts the corner of her mouth in response and keeps her gaze on the night sky.

In...and out.

“It’s a pleasure to finally meet you; I’ve been hearing all kinds of stories” he continues, rather cheerfully. When she turns to him with a raised eyebrow, though she’s more amused than anything Bilbo flushes and looks dutifully abashed. “oh, uh, I’m sorry that must have sounded awful. I’ve been hearing all kinds of good stories about you” he clarified.

Tauriel feels enough curiosity to ask, “what kind of good stories?”

“Oh many things. They say you rode Smaug, that you helped kill him and that you saved Kili, Bofur and Oin during the trip.” He sneaks a glance at her from the corner of his eye, “they also say you stood up to the Elf king, Thranduil.” He gives a little mock shudder, “I don’t know about the rest but if that’s true you’ve already earned my undying respect.” He chuckles and Tauriel gives him a small smile,

“Thranduil is largely misunderstood.”

Bilbo makes a sound remarkably similar to a snort of disbelief. He’s a sweet little fellow with his thumbs in his pockets, rocking lightly on his feet but Tauriel isn’t in the mood to make idle chit-chat, even with him and he’s stalling – she can tell.

“why are you really hear Bilbo” she asks him, not unkindly.

He’s surprised at first but then shakes his head at himself and smiles, muttering, “Just like an elf to see right through me.”

Still, he doesn’t immediately answer her question and instead takes a small pipe out of his pocket and lights it, puffing little smoke rings into the cool night air. How he had managed to hold onto it for the entire journey she doesn’t know but she likes the smell of inscence coming from the leaves he’s burning.

When he finally does speak, she’s listening carefully.

“They’re funny creatures aren’t they, dwarves? They’re stubborn and boisterous and loud and cheerful and they annoy you past logical thought one moment and then have you wondering how you could ever live without them the next. Funny, funny creatures”

He went back to puffing on his pipe while Tauriel waited for him to continue. He doesn’t, but steals glances at her every so often until Tauriel is prompted to ask, “anything else Mr. Baggins?”

“yes well, now that you mention it” he began again, pouncing on the opportunity she’d afforded him. Tauriel almost laughs. Instead a small amused smile forms on her lips.

“you’re not alone in this you know.” She sucks in a breath, her amusement fading, at the reminder of why she was out here in the first place. Once again, she’s aware of the throbbing ache in her heart.

“I know exactly how it feels to lose a friend and while I know that you and Kili are probably more I still understand how much loss hurts. The entire company does, because they love both Thorin and Kili. When you’re feeling pain and grief, its’ easy to forget that other people could be going through the same thing as you but, consider the fact that inside these walls is an entire family of dwarves suffering the loss of not one but two loved ones so...you’re not alone. You don’t have to keep it all in and be stoic and elf-like, “ he gave her a small smile and her mouth twitched upwards at the description.

He had no idea how un- stoic and un- elf like she’d been these past few days.

“when it gets bad, really bad, you don’t have to run away; we’ll be here. And when it gets better we’ll be here. And for better or worse you’ve saved our lives at least once and you’re one of us now, though it might take some a little longer than others to warm up to the idea.” he says, voice winding down to a mutter.

An image of the grim faced dwarf with the bald head and long black beard came to mind. She made a face at Bilbo and he waved it away.

“okay, maybe a lot longer, the point is...we can get through this together.” he gives her this questioning gaze when he’s done clearly waiting for an answer and she’s touched.

“I think... I would like that very much” she admitted and Bilbo beamed at her and then laughed outright when she continued, “though I am... unused to the concept of leaning”, because which elf wasn’t.

“we’ll show you how, don’t you worry about that.” He turns and gives her a small wink and Tauriel finds some small unhurt place from which to genuinely smile at him.

“He’s a fighter,” Bilbo continues softly, suddenly switching the subject and she knows at once who he’s talking about, “They both are. Don’t give up on him so soon when probably, right at this moment, he’s putting everything he has into coming back to you.”

The depth of his words caught her by surprise and though she sucked in a breath, the pang of pain she was expecting didn’t come. Bilbo fixes a steady gaze on her and Tauriel finds herself nodding. He smiles and gives one of her hands on the balcony a gentle pat, before turning to leave.

“You and Thorin...” she left the question unanswered but Bilbo turned back to her and for the first time tonight, she saw what he meant when he said that they were all suffering too; his anguish was written in the soft darkness of his eyes.

She felt a rush of compassion for this hobbit, who’d reached out to her despite his own grief.

“he’s one of the truest friends I’ve ever had I think. I...feared him at a point, admired him, and respected him. In many ways, he was the older brother I’ve never had.”

His words hang in the air for a moment before he gives her another small smile and turns once more to leave.

“Bilbo, would you like to stay with me.” She doesn’t know the where the words came from and almost immediately wants to steal them back and shut them away except...except maybe he was right about this whole leaning thing.

He gazes thoughtfully at her for a second and she knew it was because he was trying to decide whether she really wanted him to or not. Then he turned around with a slightly brighter smile and walked back to the balcony.

“don’t mind if I do actually...thank you,” he adds softly.

“No, thank you,” Tauriel whispers sincerely, her gratitude welling up from the depths of her heart. she doesn’t tell him that he’s come just at the right time, that he’s given her hope and made the pain somehow more bearable just by knowing that others are going through it as well; that his words have given her strength and a purpose to her waiting. That he’d brought the possibility of life where she could only see death.

She doesn’t say all of that but Bilbo is gazing at her, his eyes compassionate and she feels like he knows anyway.

They stand for a while, side by side, the elf and the hobbit, with hearts that are many degrees lighter, just breathing and then, formally holding out the hand of friendship, Bilbo offers her his pipe asking, “smoke ring?”

She’s never used a pipe, or made smoke figurines but still, Tauriel hesitates for only a second before she takes it.

 

***

 

It turns out she was actually pretty great at smoke figures, managing an Orc and a tree and even a dragon to Bilbo’s delight. When they parted, it was a sense of renewed strength and the knowledge that she had at least one more friend to help deal with the mess.

As she neared Kili’s room however, the growing sense of hope and the little happiness she had acquired threatened to leave her.

She has to push down a rising sense of trepidation before she can make herself enter.

As she does, she can’t help the hope that she’d find him awake, sitting up and waiting for her. When all that greets her is his still, sleeping form, the disappointment is crushing.

Still, she draws strength from the new perspective that Bilbo’s words had given her. Kili _was_ a fighter and he _would_ do whatever it took to get back to her.

She believed that with everything that she had in her. And she wasn't alone; she had at least one small but very insightful hobbit, a couple of dwarfs, one Legolas and maybe, just maybe...one Thranduil as well on her side.

Taking her seat beside him, she slides his rune stone into his palm and closes his fingers around it.

“You made a promise remember?” she whispers to him, “you said you always keep your promises. I’m going to hold you to that. And when you're awake again, i'm going to keep holding on to you. I’m right here, so hurry back; I miss you. ”

She presses a lingering kiss to his cheek and his hand before placing it back at his side and laying her head on the bed atop her folded arms. With the sound of his heartbeat steady and soothing in her ears, for the first time in all the time that has passed, Tauriel is finally at rest. 

She would wait as long as it took but,

It wouldn’t be long now...


End file.
